TNT in GCA

[Matthew Hunt]

I know TNT was used in the construction lots of "Golden Age" courses but is it still used today and do you need Goverment Improval?

[mike_beene]

I would assume in the US that this would be dependent on state or local ordinances(unless something EPA has authority over).I assume that most have heard the story of Alfred ? Nobel?

[Scott Stearns]

Still used.  Hudson National, A Fazio desgin circa 1994, benefited heavily from blasting.

Its use in New york was not more heavily regulated than cutting down trees, use of pesticides, or an of the other environmentla issues customarily found in developing a course.

[paul cowley]

We still use it....sometimes even when we don't have to [we just like the noise it makes].... and alot of the time instead of pushing over a big tree we stash a stick under it and give it a rip just to see how far we can get it to jump off the ground!

[Kyle Henderson]

If I'm not mistaken, Fazio blasted the 8th green site out of a lava flow at Pronhorn (Bend, OR), revealing a couple of lava tubes in the process.

[Jeff_Mingay]

We blew some stuff up in British Columbia throughout 2006, building golf holes.

Blasting is a really interesting operation. It's amazing how good the pros are, in regard to containing debris and noise.

[Brad Klein]

EPA has no jurisdiction over blasting. They are only involved with Army Corps of Engineers on wetlands, water course delineation and sensitive areas for golf course construction and maintenance.

The locality, usually the town, governs all permits, use and monitoring of blasting as to time, volume, safety and local hauling of materials in/out.

[Gary Daughters]

I once asked a GCA whether he was using dynamite during construction, and he said he hoped to avoid it because it drives up costs.  We didn't get into figures, and I'd be interested to know what a little boom-boom goes for.

[Tom_Doak]

Kyle:

I believe the Fazio group used dynamite on pretty much every single hole at Pronghorn ... nearly all of them are cut down into the existing terrain, and everything in Bend is volcanic rock no more than a couple of feet below the surface.

Brad:

We had to blast the sixth fairway at Stone Eagle, and they had to set up seismographs because there were existing houses within a certain radius and they had to document whether the blasting could have disturbed the foundations of the houses.

Matthew:

Back in the day, they used blasting a lot to clear trees, because they didn't have bulldozers or excavators with anywhere near the horsepower we have today.  With rare exceptions, they never would have thought of building in rock the way courses are built today.

[Brad Klein]

I have a photo and nwws article somewhere of Ross blasting away around 1916 -- I believe at Essex County Club. By the mid-1930s for George Wright Municipal in Boston, dynamiting was required to remove 10,000 cubic yards of ledge, for which 30 tons of TNT and $30,000 were allocated.

[Kyle Henderson]

Kyle:

I believe the Fazio group used dynamite on pretty much every single hole at Pronghorn ... nearly all of them are cut down into the existing terrain, and everything in Bend is volcanic rock no more than a couple of feet below the surface.

Brad:

We had to blast the sixth fairway at Stone Eagle, and they had to set up seismographs because there were existing houses within a certain radius and they had to document whether the blasting could have disturbed the foundations of the houses.

Matthew:

Back in the day, they used blasting a lot to clear trees, because they didn't have bulldozers or excavators with anywhere near the horsepower we have today.  With rare exceptions, they never would have thought of building in rock the way courses are built today.

Maybe someday Steve Wynn will fund drilling efforts so Fazio can create his own volcano, allowing him to spread directed lava flows around his designated course routing to save him from the burden of blasting into preexisting rock...

On a different note,
I recall reading that Robert Trent Jones used bulldozers to crush the lava fields (rather than or in addition to blasting with TNT?) during the construction of Mauna Kea back in the mid-1960's. Thoughts or info anybody?

[Matthew Hunt]

4th at Baff Springs looks a pretty cool blasted out of the Mountian with TNT.

Does any-one know how it costs and how much Trees/Rock it blows up?

[Brian_Ewen]

Was MacK. totally against dynamiting ? .

I was just thinking back to what he wrote in the Spirit of St.Andrews , where he thought dynamiting rock at Hazlehead was a bad idea , and turfed over them instead .

[Joe Hancock]

Perhaps that was part of the genius of the Golden Age guys...

Dynamite + alcohol = Creativity!

Maybe MacKenzie was afraid of death......

Joe