Anan observatory rebuild on track for summer viewing season

When contractor Jesse West said, "we destroyed everything," it sounds pretty bad, out of context.

But that's exactly what his Petersburg company Rainforest Contracting was hired to do - pull down the old Anan bear viewing deck and walkway and put up a new one for the U.S. Forest Service.

"So far we've demo-ed everything that was up there," West, president of Rainforest Contracting, said March 29. "It's all stacked in piles and ready to get taken out of there."

The concrete and wood and metal roofing will be disposed of at the dump in Petersburg.

"That's where we are based out of, that's where the barge will return to," West said.

Rainforest Contracting has hired a barge from Lituya Freight Runners in Petersburg and a helicopter from Temsco Helicopters to fly in the material to rebuild everything.

West said he's got four to seven people working on the new Anan Wildlife Observatory at any given time, and he has been on the job the entire time. They plan to start the concrete pour this week to create solid columns that will be anchored to the rock for the structures. "Similar to what was there before, (but) a little bigger, a little better attachment into the rock," West said.

"We like to give the concrete about seven days," he said. By the time they pour it all, get back to Petersburg, and load another barge, it'll be ready.

Then it's on to steel beams and joists in May, followed by the deck.

"We're building the structure in the shop right now, in Petersburg," West said.

West works on construction projects year-round, and said the Anan Wildlife Observatory build-out didn't break any new ground for his company, which has been in operation for 14 years. He did observe the old structure appeared to be a collaboration of about four different projects, "it looked like it wasn't built all at once."

The Forest Service concurred.

Anan has a long history, District Recreation Staff Officer Tory Houser said Friday.

"If you go through the history of these bear-viewing areas, they typically didn't start that way," she said. "They often started as fish ladders," a structure that allows migrating fish to bypass obstacles on a river or stream.

"People were like, wow, we can also bring people to watch the bears," Houser said.

A shelter was added in the 1960s. "There were several iterations of building-on to accommodate this new type of use," she said.

The contractor said it helps starting with a clean slate.

"We took everything right down to the rocks," he said.

The company plans to make good on its $989,800 contract in the first or second week of June, in time for the July 5 - Aug. 25 viewing season.