Llangollen Canal Breach, Whitchurch. The Old Culvert is UNCOVERED!

Added: 2026-05-05

[00:00:00]Hello everyone. Back at the Clangot Bridge site just about to take off.

[00:00:04]Quite a lot of activity already. So we'll just have a little look what's going on.

[00:00:21]>> As we can see the large 25 ton excavators in the actual reach as it was last week.

[00:00:32]tracking in nicely.

[00:00:34]Got Ernie stood next to me.

[00:00:38]And if we fly a little bit away from ourselves, get rid of the noise of the the drone.

[00:00:51]We can see that they are starting to dig the culvert out. The famous culvert.

[00:00:59]See if we can get a slightly better view. I'm not sure if we will because of the trees.

[00:01:18]I'm going to go up a little bit higher and see if we can get an aerial view to see if we can.

[00:01:24]Luckily, it's quite a nice day today.

[00:01:28]at the moment anyway.

[00:01:45]See the dumper there?

[00:01:47]Got uh some materials from the drilling rig in and the uh 9-tonon excavators doing the digging here.

[00:02:15]People watching on very very gently with it.

[00:02:27]You can see how much sediment has come out of the bank.

[00:02:32]Um, they're using that bucket there that hasn't it has got teeth on, but then it's got a a toe that's been attached to it. Toe is like a blade on the front of a bucket. And then you haven't got a uh you haven't got teeth that will rip into a pipe or services or anything like that.

[00:03:03]He's got a shower waiting in case something does come apparent so he can do a bit of investigations by hand as well.

[00:03:14]So if the water's going down in that spot, you would expect it to pass underneath here at some point.

[00:03:37]And we're getting towards the soil now as opposed to the sand that's come out of the embankment.

[00:04:06]So once you've hit the soil then I guess the cover will be below that surface as well. So there may be a bit more digging to do yet.

[00:04:15]It's hard to see from above how deep they are but they're kind of uh the height of a of a bucket, aren't they? So, keeping an eye on my little Ernie, too, and being a good lad.

[00:04:36]He's got the old to have a bit of a dig now, just to see if he can see anything. Go down a couple of spades depths. He finds nothing and take another load out with a with a digger without destroying anything.

[00:05:00]Oh, I just overshot a little bit. So, I'm zoomed in. Sorry about that.

[00:05:04]Just trying to move sideways a little bit. See if I can get a slightly better view without his back in the shot.

[00:05:26]It looks like he hasn't found anything.

[00:05:28]So, we're probably going back in for another dig now.

[00:05:32]Get another bucket or two out.

[00:05:38]That's pretty standard practice with with digging to have a a man with a spade or a shovel on hand.

[00:06:00]expect this call. It could be quite deep personally, but it will be interesting to see if it is or not.

[00:06:13]I can see my drone up in the air. quite high, but just keeping an eye on it.

[00:06:20]Um, and I'm just walking over to the gateway into the flood field so I can see what the the guys are doing in real view as well.

[00:06:31]Can't just only see me drone. I can see them.

[00:06:38]Just while we're waiting for that small digger to start again and get you a bit of an aerial view of the uh larger excavator and he's just started digging again. So I'll go back to small digger.

[00:07:02]Thank you for all the new subscribers.

[00:07:03]Had lots last week. I think this month we've had nearly a thousand new subscribers to the channel. That's great to to hear.

[00:07:12]He's starting to just cave the sides in a little bit. If you have to dig deeper, you have to go slightly wider so the sides don't cave in.

[00:07:21]Especially if there's a man in the hole, you don't want it to cave in on him.

[00:07:25]Many of people have been injured or even killed in such circumstances.

[00:07:34]Um yeah, if you're new to the channel and haven't subscribed already or haven't subscribed, please do click the subscribe button and ring the notification bell.

[00:07:46]Um that would be highly appreciated.

[00:07:51]Helps the channel out no end. also means you don't get to miss any of the future updates of this or the the shed build or any of the other projects I'm following.

[00:08:05]They're going to have a lot of water in the hole at a minute. The side with the water starting to cave in.

[00:08:12]Looks like he's going to let that in anyway.

[00:08:22]I guess I was trying to keep the hole dry.

[00:08:26]Excuse me.

[00:08:51]With the way they're leveling the brereech out with the large excavator from the gate entrance, it almost doesn't look like a breach site. Just looks like a a hillside now. An embankment if you like.

[00:09:07]Waiting for the water to level out. I'll scoop some of the wash out, I presume, with the uh with the bucket. Looney.

[00:09:19]There's a good lad.

[00:09:21]He's a good boy, ain't he?

[00:09:27]Obviously, I have to take the uh water and the wet material away and preferably lower down than where he's digging. So, it isn't just going to flow back in.

[00:09:46]whether the large excavator is um tracking it all in making as compact as pardon me as possible.

[00:09:57]Pardon me, they got hiccups. Uh so they can start thinking about getting the pad foot roller in to possibly compact it further or I'm not sure what their plan is if they're going to be digging a lot of this out.

[00:10:14]Be interesting to find that out but we haven't been told about that yet.

[00:10:18]Whether they know or not, I'm not sure going very tentively whether it's whether they can hear a bit of stone or something there. So that could be uh brick over a old culvert potentially.

[00:10:44]I guess this is a brick line culvert.

[00:10:54]Try and zoom in while we're not digging.

[00:10:58]It's like something hard there.

[00:11:14]See him just scraping across it.

[00:11:20]It could have a stone top, I suppose. It could have all sorts of constructions, but certainly old, so obviously won't be a plastic cover or a twin wall pipe or a concrete pipe.

[00:11:41]Certainly be a lot older than that.

[00:11:45]You can presume it'll be built with either a stone top, slate top, or a an arch top.

[00:11:55]So, we've widened the hole considerably.

[00:11:56]Now, that's where the water was seeping in where the excavator bucket is at the moment.

[00:12:08]It wasn't running in freely cuz it did stop running when the head of water disappeared off it.

[00:12:19]So, I guess they're going to dig where the water was getting in to see if there's a gap in the in the actual brick work or into the culvert.

[00:12:33]Could be the culvert continues along underground there and uh it's just found its way between the brick work or between the lid sections or whatever's on it takes this bit of soil away. It may uh the water in the on the left hand side may work its way down through wherever it was going.

[00:13:16]I'm just going to come down a little bit.

[00:13:20]don't want to come down a lot because uh there is another drone in the air and I'm trying to stay on a different height to uh keep us separate so we're both safe.

[00:13:37]I've come down now to 40 m instead of 60 so I can zoom in a bit more.

[00:13:54]I'm in the element here watching this very much. So obviously I want you all to see this but uh I find this very interesting myself.

[00:14:36]Need to get some of that slop out by the looks.

[00:14:43]Honey, and he's just run off. So, I'm going go and have a little look where he's gone.

[00:14:52]Hopefully he's not not gone too far.

[00:14:56]Honey, where you gone? Come on.

[00:15:01]He's come back now.

[00:15:04]Nearly pushed me over. Caught me off balance.

[00:15:11]Sorry, I keep zooming in and out. Try and get a better video of the what's going on around and also in the hole.

[00:15:23]Good luck. You don't need to jump on me knee just at the minute.

[00:16:21]Zoom out again and just looks like they're trying to see if the water's draining away.

[00:16:29]Ready boy.

[00:17:08]the large excavator has uh stopped a little bit.

[00:17:15]It does look like someone's just uh walking down towards him. So, I'll zoom out so you can see him approaching.

[00:17:22]That's beauty of being here. So I can see it. It looks like he's gone elsewhere to be fair.

[00:17:40]Whether he was one of the drillers and he's just seen a pigeon.

[00:17:50]So he's chaps gone towards pipe work.

[00:18:28]Ernie, Ernie, Ernie, stop.

[00:18:33]One doesn't need to bark all the time.

[00:18:36]Come on, sit down now.

[00:18:41]So loud on me microphone, Ernie, when he barks. Sorry about that.

[00:18:55]And the other worker seems to have gone over towards there. You can see myself. Hello.

[00:19:15]What's the reading now?

[00:19:20]>> 18,000 >> 18.

[00:19:41]tidy.

[00:19:49]>> I don't know really. I think they're getting there. They found something.

[00:20:14]I'm getting a bit short on battery, so I am going to have to come down for a battery change shortly.

[00:20:20]I might do that in a moment.

[00:20:26]See what they do here.

[00:20:35]getting all the slop out at the moment.

[00:20:44]So I think that's 18.7 million lers now been pumped. So we're getting up towards 19 million lers.

[00:20:51]It's uh 18.7,000 cube I think.

[00:21:14]That's obviously digging a lot deeper now than the left hand side.

[00:21:24]See the water running from left to right.

[00:21:32]It's definitely on something hard there because you can see the bucket vibrating.

[00:21:37]Dig a bit of a hole to the to the right hand side. All the water and slop should flow that way like a sump. So you can get the the material out.

[00:21:53]I think that's the edge, isn't it?

[00:22:01]So, I think we've just seen the first sight of this uh culvert, which they are going to dig down the side of by the looks.

[00:22:12]When he was on the wall, then he somehow got up on top of the wall.

[00:22:20]That's definitely the edge there. You can see it.

[00:22:30]Great that we've been able to see this and watch this. This is something that lots of people have awaited for.

[00:22:42]Awesome to see.

[00:22:55]Listen.

[00:23:18]Looks a bit similar in style to the other side, which you would half expect. It does look curved there, doesn't it?

[00:23:42]Almost looks like there's water flowing outwards from it from the left to the right a little bit when he takes a bucket. You can see it just swirling a little bit.

[00:23:58]Maybe what he's pushing in getting towards dry material now.

[00:24:25]I'm getting quite short on battery now.

[00:24:27]So, I am going to uh zoom out and come back. I will go back up with another battery. Hopefully, we don't miss too much.

[00:25:54]So, we've just uh gone back up.

[00:26:01]Josh from Taylor Aboard are here.

[00:26:04]They're flying at 24 meters. So, I've just asked them that. So, I'm going to fly at 35 or above.

[00:26:11]I'll keep us both safe.

[00:26:18]A bit of luck.

[00:26:22]Pardon me.

[00:26:32]Now up at 40 mters.

[00:26:36]I'm just going to zoom in and have a bit of a look at the what we can see. That's definitely the wall that was like on the other side.

[00:26:54]That's called a drain head. That's what a drain pokes through. Stop the soil eroding into the drain.

[00:27:33]That's great to see.

[00:27:59]Don't know quite what I've done there. I pressed something on me controller. I do apologize about that.

[00:28:09]something I'm not done before that isn't interesting.

[00:28:36]Sorry about that.

[00:28:42]This is really, really good to see.

[00:28:53]Something we've long to long to see.

[00:29:34]showing Terry the uh >> cor there.

[00:29:40]>> See the wall.

[00:29:53]Looks like they're just opening up the ground around it. At which point I'm going to uh come and land for a little bit and I'll set you up in a little bit of time.

[00:30:08]We fly over this way. Just have a look back at the two gents in the bridge.

[00:30:18]Talking about that, which looks like they're making a bit of a access way in so people can come and look at it and test it and whatnot.

[00:30:36]Um, while we're up, just actually just before we do come down. Oh, there's a drilling rig. That's a good view. Have a little look at that through the trees. Perfect view there.

[00:30:49]So, they're setting up to drill there this week by the looks.

[00:30:54]And on site in the compound, we have a lot of work vans, a lot of vehicles, including a green van here, which looks like it's from the generator firm, possibly chairs for the offices. And I guess some of these are going to be offices and set up for people to work in to be on site. So I presume that will be what's in those.

[00:31:29]So now I've had a good overview of everything. I will come down and uh we can uh take you back up to have another view in a little while. So thank you for that.

[00:32:10]Just hear the drone approaching probably.

[00:32:19]any to get landed on any >> good and we shall see you shortly >> hello we're just back now just going to take you up again >> take I'm just over the uh compound here.

[00:33:02]We can see tanker services gap higher.

[00:33:09]Almost looks like it's a pump out.

[00:33:12]service for the uh possibly for the welfare cabin.

[00:33:23]Does that mean the uh cabins are off off gap higher? Could be. There's also another drilling rig just arrived.

[00:33:34]Maybe they're stepping up uh the speed of drilling with a second rig.

[00:33:41]That's a possibility.

[00:33:49]Great to see. No more work yet in the actual around the culvert area, but uh we will keep an eye on that. I can spin around and show you.

[00:34:04]There's the excavator in the in the bridge. I think they're perhaps having their morning break.

[00:34:14]I would say they are. They got a cup of coffee on the machine.

[00:34:21]Of course, there's the uh excavator around the cullet.

[00:34:28]Just go back to the compound briefly.

[00:34:36]This could explain why there's so many vans on site.

[00:34:41]Um, got one rig set up as we've said and uh will be a further one being set up.

[00:34:56]Looks like a very busy day ahead. Do keep tuned. Lots to see.

[00:35:02]Bring you back shortly.

[00:35:30]We just look up here.

[00:35:32]See Ernie.

[00:35:35]Hello Ernie.

[00:35:50]Uh hello. We're just bringing you back and we shall take off now.

[00:35:57]>> Take off.

[00:36:08]>> And there is the new drilling rig.

[00:36:12]and a van within the actual bridge almost driven down the old tow path. I would have said I guess they must have driven in and then backed up on that area.

[00:36:34]So maybe they're setting up a new drilling rig there.

[00:36:40]The wheel dumper is back into the brereech.

[00:36:48]The large excavator is there.

[00:36:53]And there is people down by the old culvert that they were digging out before which we will have a look at in a moment.

[00:37:07]Dumper.

[00:37:16]It's like he's got a rope or some such being connected to it.

[00:37:32]He's having a good sniff of the grass.

[00:37:54]Looks like the dumper's getting the uh the pads that were being used for the drilling rig out of the actual bridge site.

[00:38:13]We spin around. Have a look at the drilling rig again and the large excavator. He's doing a bit of grading on the old roadway trackway if you like.

[00:38:32]There's the compound. The wagon's left now. The tanker.

[00:38:57]see the drilling rig on the right hand side of the screen and the new drilling rig on the left with a large excavator in the foreground.

[00:39:10]Great to see a small excavator coming up too.

[00:39:23]It's all go this morning like dancing diggers.

[00:39:35]You can really see the size difference between the two there.

[00:39:57]Just filming the screen of my drone here for a little bit of a sneak peek of what's going on today. Do look out for the full video later on.

[00:40:07]Lots going on.

[00:40:36]There's the uh new exposed culvert. As you can see, water filling up to the uh drain head going through the middle of the hole.

[00:40:49]Do look out for the full video later on.

[00:40:56]Just uh doing a couple of shorts while we're looking at the screen.

[00:41:08]Some people can upload videos on site here. I've not got the relevant technology to do that or know how I guess. So, uh, I like to just film a short or two and then, uh, put those up and then obviously put the full video up later on.

[00:42:01]Looks like the small excavator and the jumpers working in tandem with the uh I was going to say in tandem with each other, but now it doesn't look like that. Looks like he's getting putting stuff into the drilling rig van or out of the van into the dumper and then the uh diggers going down maybe towards the culvert on the other side.

[00:42:31]That's a possibility.

[00:42:34]We shall wait and see.

[00:42:37]There's vans up in the far turning circle access road up there.

[00:42:50]of which is there's a pavement fenced off all the way to that site. Now that's where the small excavator seems to be heading as well.

[00:43:21]Doing a bit of extra grading work towards where the bands are just reversed onto I think I'm going to come back and we'll bring you back shortly.

[00:44:10]Come here. Come here. Good lad.

[00:44:18]>> There we are. Landing. We shall bring you back shortly.

[00:44:23]And hello. Just bringing you back.

[00:44:27]>> Take off and have a little look what's going on.

[00:44:36]updated.

[00:44:41]>> And it looks like they're just lifting the uh drilling rig up, the new drilling rig up.

[00:44:58]And going back down again.

[00:45:20]I guess I have to chalk it so it's completely level.

[00:45:27]So it lifts up. Well, we're going to start winching it up again now, I presume.

[00:45:53]Really good to see them winching this up and getting it upright.

[00:46:02]It's a bit of a treat as well.

[00:46:10]It's not quite level, so they're more likely going down again.

[00:46:17]You just saw it rocking a little bit then. So I guess I need to just chuck it slightly more on one side.

[00:46:24]Adjust it.

[00:46:27]Please do uh post any comments you wish and I will read them. I'm trying to respond to some of them. I love reading your comments.

[00:46:39]I don't know if you can hear on the microphone, but there is uh what sounds like a like a pet engine almost um running in the background. whether there's a pet engine or some such on on the winch.

[00:47:08]I may do a uh afternoon update and then do a evening update as well later on because there's there's going to be some length in this video. Quite a lot's happened.

[00:47:37]There's the leg going around to make the tripod.

[00:47:40]Once they're in position, all um braced up, I presume then the winch will be let down.

[00:47:54]Just checking it's level and straight by the looks.

[00:48:05]I'm just going to zoom out on that and have a little look around.

[00:48:29]Oh, I zoomed in a bit quicker there. I apologize.

[00:48:38]I think uh I may I may come in and land and nip off home now. So uh unless anything else happens and I take off again, I will just say thank you very much for watching and do uh check back for the evening update later on.

[00:48:59]Um be great to see you. Hopefully you like this video and of course there will be more videos later in the week tomorrow onwards.

[00:49:10]Thank you very much and hope you have a really good day so far.

[00:49:41]If we just turn around here, we should be able to see Karen there.

[00:49:49]There he is.

[00:49:55]And landing. Thank you very much. See you soon.

[00:50:00]Hello. Just bring you back one last time.

[00:50:04]And we're taking off again.

[00:50:10]>> Updated.

[00:50:25]to have some kind of cameraman on site for the uh possibly to film this this area they've dug out.

[00:50:52]sort of catch this before I do zoom off.

[00:50:57]Oh, or maybe they're filming the flood field as as it is.

[00:51:10]Some kind of media possibly.

[00:51:24]Large excavator is not doing an awful lot.

[00:51:30]Rhythm rig looks a little bit more set up.

[00:51:48]and the small excavator.

[00:51:53]Look like he's changing his bucket there or putting a bucket on.

[00:52:00]He's been doing a bit of digging.

[00:52:06]Also look like we've got a bit of a delivery on site.

[00:52:10]station careers UK limited.

[00:52:16]He's digging a bit of space off there.

[00:52:22]Where that curry is going.

[00:52:34]Let's zoom over these cabins and have a little look before we leave.

[00:52:38]Everything's changed.

[00:52:47]I presume they're setting up the cabins a bit today. All those chairs seem to have disappeared in If we just spin round, there's the new drilling rig there.

[00:53:24]The old ones in the trees there.

[00:53:37]large excavator.

[00:53:38]We'll just fly over the other side of this culver. See if there's been any change during the time we've been here.

[00:53:47]I can't imagine there has been. Just have a little look in there.

[00:53:57]All looks the same as it was pretty much.

[00:54:05]There's a drilling rig we're on about, but I think I'm going to call it a morning now. So, I will uh come into land and uh try and do an evening update later on. Thank you very much for watching and we shall see you later.