3 Hurt In Incident On Dredge Barge Off Seaside Heights: Official

SEASIDE HEIGHTS, NJ — An apparent explosion Monday on one of the dredge barges involved in the beach replenishment project in northern Ocean County has injured three people, a Seaside Heights official confirmed Monday.

Seaside Heights Fire Chief William Rumbolo said firefighters from the borough, Seaside Park, Lavallette and the Ocean Beach section of Toms River responded to the Grant Avenue beach following the report of a possible explosion on the barge, shortly after 2 p.m. on Monday.

Rumbolo said responders launched a rescue boat but when it arrived at the barge, learned from the barge captain that three people who had been injured were loaded onto a tugboat that was sent to Manasquan Inlet.

None of the injuries was thought to be life-threatening, the captain told the Seaside responders, Rumbolo said.

The tug reached the New Jersey State Marine Police station in Point Pleasant Beach and the three injured were transferred to waiting ambulances, according to radio communications.

The cause of the incident on the dredge barge was still unknown Monday afternoon. Weeks Marine, the contractor on the $128 million beach replenishment project, has four dredges — two multiple-suction hopper dredges and two pipeline dredges —working off the northern Ocean County barrier island, transferring sand pulled from offshore sites to the beach.

The dredge affected in the incident Monday is sitting in the ocean off Casino Pier. The incident was first reported by Ocean County Scanner News, which posted about it at 2:21 p.m.. Jersey Shore Hurricane News reported a suction pipe, used to pull sand from the ocean floor before it is pumped onto the beach, burst in the dredge off Grant Avenue.

The project, which began with a preliminary beach fill in Ortley Beach in June 2017, was initially expected to be completely by later this year. But equipment issues have disrupted work.

Video below shows one of the pipeline dredges in action.

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Photo of first responders on the beach at Grant Avenue in Seaside Heights provided by Administrator Christopher Vaz