The award ceremony was held in Durban on Thursday, October 16. Tuiniqua submitted the following projects for this year’s SAICE Awards: Karatara River Weir (in the Technical Excellence category as well as the Community Based category) and also the rectification of 2 144 RDP houses in Thembalethu, George (Community Based category).
They walked away with two awards, namely Joint Winning Project in the Technical Excellence and the Environmental Division category and Joint Winning Project with SIKA Environmental Engineering. All three their submissions were chosen as finalists.
This year SAICE received 38 project entries from across the country. According to Theuns Mynhardt of Tuiniqua Consulting Engineers, this was a record number of entries.
Mynhardt said: "To be considered for a SAICE award, the project should have unique or unusual features and should demonstrate some notable advance in the solution of engineering problems; it should have particular aesthetic appeal; display engineering ingenuity in analysis or design and/or in construction technique; show functional efficiency; the handling of impacts on the environment should be particularly successful and the project must be well managed, finished on time and within the budget.
Karatara River - project summary
The project is located on the Karatara River approximately 5km from Sedgefield and lies in the highly ecological sensitive Wilderness Lakes area.
Mynhardt explained that during drought periods, or even during low rainfall periods the Swartvlei Estuary mouth closes, due to low flows in the rivers feeding the Swartvlei, from the Karatara River, Hoogekraal River and the Wolwe River. "These low flows cause another problem and that is saline contamination from the Swartvlei into the Karatara River at the Ruigtevlei water treatment works (WTW). The WTW is not equipped to deal with high salinity water and the water in the natural basin cannot be utilised for human consumption. The estimated capacity of the basin is 32Ml. The project was initiated to put in place some kind of preventative measures and different alternatives were investigated.
"The project is an innovative 80m long concrete weir across the Karatara River with stainless steel gates that open and close automatically. A fish ladder was incorporated in the design to assist aquatic species to overcome this man-made obstacle. The Karatara River is perennial, vulnerable to flash flooding, so this risk had to be considered during construction when the river was flowing normally. A series of 2m-diameter precast concrete caissons were sunk 3,5m apart and 2,5m to 3m deep, with in-situ concrete cast between them. A concrete beam was constructed at causeway level to tie the caissons together and to hold the two weir gates in position.
"The capacity of the two weir gates matched the capacity of the pipe culverts below the existing causeway. The relationship between the top level of the existing causeway and weir was critical. The level of the weir is 200mm lower than the causeway to avoid increased flooding of adjacent properties. Gabion mattresses with energy dissipating walls were installed in the 6m gap between the weir and the causeway, to reduce scouring or additional pressure on the causeway."
Celebrating Tuiniqua Consulsting Engineers' two accolades received at the 2014 South African Institution Of Civil Engineering (SAICE) Awards gala evening, are (in front, from left) Rodney Nay (retired: Knysna Municipality), Serett Maree (Tuiniqua Consulting Engineers), Dennis Burns (B&V Contractors), Melissa Mackay (Cape EAPrac), Peter Townshend (Amanziflow Projects) and Andre Petersen (Knysna Municipality). At the back are Theuns Mynhardt (Tuiniqua Consulting Engineers), Marcel Geldenhuys (B&V Contractors) and Dennis McDonald (Outeniqua Geotechnical Services).
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