It's a protection system for flooding that has rarely been used throughout the country. That's from Lakefront Restorers president Jon Graham, who installed the flood protection system at Delta Beach. Graham explains the system.

"2011 and 2014 have been major floods. There really hasn't been too many other projects like this in Manitoba or Canada as Geotextile Tubes are made from a geotextile fabric. The fabric is sewn into a tubular form coming in varying lengths. They're often used as watering tubes as well, where basically a slurry mixture is pumped into them. In our case we used a sand/water slurry mixture, and put it into the tubes allowing the water to de-water out, leaving the solids behind, and the sand. And what it does is it solidifies a large tubular form almost egg-shaped that is left behind. These Geotextile Tubes also have what they call a scour apron underneath. The scour apron prevents any washout from underneath the tubes causing it to roll or deform it in its place. In a lot of cases like what we had in a flood situation, the scour apron was set up quite high. So, a lower water event is actually somewhat compromised in that it if it's set as such a high elevation, it has to work overtime to be able to scour down. Basically what it does is it self heals. If sand washed out from in front, it droops down and protects underneath that tube."

He notes they had to shop out of the country for the product.

"The tube material is manufactured down in the States for us. It's a common product they use quite a bit. The reason we States side with it is because it's an ideal manufacturer. They've got quality products. We tried a couple of other ones out there, and they didn't step up to the plate with quality. And overall if you're going to do a flood protection project start with the best. That's why we did what we did. The tubes are sewn down there. Flint Industries is the company out of Georgia."

Graham explains situations arose with stagnant water ponds forming behind the tubes at Delta Beach. The RM of Portage la prairie hired the company to remove parts of the system.

"We've completed all the removals of the sections we'll be doing. We basically did almost a surgical removal of certain sections of the tubes to allow some influx of water on the backside behind the tubes, to try and clear out some of the marshy conditions, and allow the sand to fill up to occur in behind the tubes. There's still the affordability of the protection of the tubes out front, but now we have to address some of the concerns of -- in some areas -- there are some very deep sinkholes that were part of the installation initially, that just happened to fill in naturally. So, we're kind of encourage nature in other ways to fill those in."

He explains how they tubes are severed.

"We took a simple knife and sliced down the side of the tube to the desired spot where we wanted to terminate, or just shy of our termination. Then we pulled the fabric off the top of it; pulled the sand out of it, and removed the remaining amount of fabric. Then what we did is we took a water pump and we wash out sand from the end of the tube. I use a simple analogy of opening a bag of chips from the end and starting to eat the chips. And as you eat the chips you can roll up the bag, and pinch it off. And that's essentially what we did. We almost put a chip clip on the tube. By chip clip we use smaller tubes. They're 5' X 10''. And they are placed about a foot and a half high. And we pump them full of sand. So, they're mini-Geotextile Tubes. And we place those on the cut ends and hold it down and hold it in place from having any more sand wash out."

Graham notes it's a system that hasn't been used too often.

"I'd say it's probably the longest project of Geotextile Tubes in Canada to date. It's quite remarkable to be a part of that kind of project."

A couple of weekends ago RCMP caught vandals in the act who were destroying parts of the tubes.

"We are done with the removals that we were doing. There was actually a few vandalisms that happened, which is a little bit discouraging, in a way."

Graham says they had to incorporate removal of vandalized tubes with their removal process.

Jon Graham"We were able to include them in some of our cuts that we made. They created some energy and work that had to be done. But we made sure they were taken care of and addressed in the most effective way that we could. They were taken care of. They were fixed. It's just sad to see vandalism done there."

He notes many of the residents at Delta Beach did not want to see any of them removed.

"The tubes are providing a huge amount of protection. And yes, there are some consequences of that protection by having some deeper holes in the back. But in chatting with a lot of the cottage owners that were coming out, some were saying, 'Please don't even cut them in front of our place.' Not that we were. They just saw us going up and down the beach. But saying, 'This is the best protection we've seen ever.' And they've been there for 41 years. In fact, they're almost worried about their boulders on their shoreline being compromised if the tube had to come out. And I'm sitting there doing shoreline work saying, 'These rocks put in are supposed to protect you.' The tube is doing that much better of a job, and they have more faith in the tubes."

Graham says they implemented the protection elsewhere in Manitoba.

"They're all around the lakes. We're doing a bunch of work over in Woodlands Twin Lakes Beach area in similar sort of circumstances. We had some people there that are just begging us to keep them in place. They were just saying, 'Get another extension. Until something is done with an outlet, let's keep them here as long as we can. And possibly indefinitely.' We actually did a full engineering study over in the RM of Woodlands for permanent Geotextile Tube protection, and seeing it installed, as what they're intended for, in non-emergency situations. So, install them as if they were supposed to be there for the long term, not just the short term."

When asked about the longevity of the system, Graham explained, "Down in the gulf coast, and there's some in Mexico that are 15 plus years old. They're sitting in salt water conditions, exposed to UV way beyond what we'll ever see, and exposed to UV 365 days a year, where we're snow covered half the year. The life spans of these tubes is in excess of 15 years uncovered. Covered, I mean they have almost an indefinite life-span. If they were buried as a sand dune form, as long as they stay covered they would basically be there almost indefinitely until they started to rot, which would be potentially 50 plus years."

See: Partial Geotextile Tubes Removal At Delta Beach

VIDEO of DRONE AERIAL FOOTAGE:

Drone operated by Jason Borowiec of Lakefront Restorers