The picture of the repaired road is amazing @ How Alaska fixed its earthquake-shattered roads in just days is amazing. Shame I can’t paste and copy it here.
A small sample of it.
Working 24/7, they cleared away the broken asphalt, saving it to be melted down at a later date. Then, crews with heavy equipment began digging out water-saturated sediments that slipped or sunk during the quake. They trucked in or gathered fresh material and compacted it, creating a sturdy earthwork base. Atop that, they placed large rocks, finer gravel, and finally, asphalt.
“Our asphalt plants were all shut down for the winter,” McCarthy says. Thick and tarry, asphalt needs to be heated up from a solid form before it can be spread out in a thick layer to make a road. But Alaska in late fall is bitterly cold, and frozen asphalt can take a week or longer to melt into a sticky, pliable material. Soon after the earthquake struck, owners of asphalt plants switched on their heaters. “We were fortunate that they did that.” McCarthy says. “By the time we’d finished the earthworks, the asphalt plants were ready to go.”
Isn’t it amazing what can be done when one is prepared for it?