Delays continue to plague the Bogue Chitto River bridge project,but site supervisors say the latest roadblock will beshort-lived.

T.L. Wallace Construction Co. of Columbia received the contractto complete the bridge last month after the original contractor wasterminated from the contract. T.L. Wallace had expected to begininstalling the last 110-foot section of bridge Wednesday, but rainand technical issues resulting from taking over another company’sproject made them postpone that activity until this week.

Rain continues to delay the project, said Jay Carney, thecompany’s operations manager.

“We were planning on starting today and tomorrow, but we’re notsure what this rain is going to do,” he said.

Jimmy Bullock, site supervisor, said Monday morning crews wouldcontinue to work on the site doing minor work while they watch theweather.

“The rain has got us messed up,” he said. “I’m not sure if we’llbe able to start on that today or not. We’re ready to go once theweather clears.”

Bullock said it will take his crew about two days to hang thelast section once they can begin. A second crew is working on thedirt work around the banks of the river.

Carney estimated the project would take no longer than fourmonths to complete once the company began to work on thebridge.

The bridge has been the subject of controversy in the BogueChitto area since it was closed nearly two years ago. Originallyprojected by December 2005 at the latest, the bridge has lain idlesince September, when the original contractor, Mid-SouthConstruction of Columbia, removed its work crews from the site.Mid-South was declared in default of its contract May 16.

The contractor’s bonding agency, Insurance Company of the West(ICW), took over the project June 6 and contracted T.L. WallaceConstruction to complete the project.

The original bridge contract was awarded for $2.8 million.Mid-South had been paid $2.63 million for their work, leaving only$553,500 left in federal funds to complete the contract, saidCounty Engineer Carl Ray Furr. That total is not enough to completethe contract, but the bonding agency must absorb any additionalcosts, he said.

ICW is also being assessed a fine of $390 for each day since thecontract expired that they could be working on the project untilthe bridge’s completion. The penalty was originally levied againstMid-South, which has since gone out of business.

The Bogue Chitto River Bridge was one of several large contractsawarded to Mid-South in a short time frame and they apparentlybecame overextended, Furr said.

Mid-South was also terminated from bridge contracts in AmiteCounty and Simpson County. Leake County had also had problems withthe contractor on their bridge contract.

All of those contracts have been taken over by the bondingagency, Furr said. The Bogue Chitto River bridge was the first toget ICW’s attention because it is the largest of the projects andis approximately 80 percent complete. It was also the first of thecontracts that was awarded.