NEWBURYPORT HARBOR — The massive hull sits idle, its work here essentially done.
The cutter suction dredge Illinois, the star player in the dredging of the Merrimack River channel and renourishing of seriously eroded beaches in Newbury and Salisbury, will soon be towed back to Norfolk, Va., whence it came in early September.
But even at rest, the dredge is a muscular piece of machinery capable of inspiring awe.
The Illinois is owned by Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co. of Oak Brook, Ill., which is under contract for the project with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Great Lakes' local site manager, Jenna Libby, led a small group of visitors on a stem-to-stern tour of the 320-foot-long vessel.
The guests were members of the Merrimack River Beach Alliance, a multi-agency task force that, under the leadership of state Sen. Bruce Tarr, spent two years planning the dredging and beach nourishment project.
Tarr is a Gloucester Republican whose district includes Newbury.
The tour was arranged by Cynthia Lewis, director of Intergovernmental Relations and Special Projects in Tarr's office.
"Each person here played a role in getting this project done," Lewis said, standing on the deck of Great Lakes' crew boat, the Cooper River.
The group consisted of Ron Barrett, president of Plum Island Taxpayers and Associates; Bob Connors, director of the Plum Island Foundation; Doug Packer, Newbury conservation agent; David Vine, Newbury's consulting engineer, and Newbury Selectmen Joseph Story and Geof Walker.
In addition to Libby, the group was escorted by two Army Corps staffers: Mark Habel, chief of the Engineering-Planning Division of the Navigation Section in the New England District; and Bob Casoli Jr., the project's on-site quality control manager.
Libby first directed the Cooper River pilot to steer parallel to the newly renourished beach on Plum Island then to the front of the dredge to give the guests a close-up view of the cutter head, a multi-clawed ball of steel that digs sand from the bottom of the channel.
On board the Illinois, the group climbed two flights to the bridge, where a single operator, sitting in front of a bank of screens, controls the speed and depth of the cutter head, the consistency of the slurry mix of sand and water that gets pumped onto the beach, and the position of the dredge along the five anchor cables that guide its movement in the water.
Descending to the middle of the 34-year-old vessel, Libby explained the workings of the main pump, which is capable of pushing a maximum of 3,000 cubic yards of slurry an hour into the pipeline.
The slurry — 70 percent water, 30 percent sand — is pumped the entire length of the dredge and into a connection at the stern that carries the mixture to the beach, where it is spread by bulldozers to shape the beach configuration.
In full-scale operation, Libby said, the vessel pumps 24 hours a day. Eight crew members work 12-hour shifts on board the Illinois. Other two-man crews work aboard each of three support tugboats: the Brangus, the Lone Star State and the Candice L.
Great Lakes and the Army Corps each conduct independent surveys of both the beach and the channel to assure that the completed work meets specifications, Habel said. The Army Corps surveys should be finished by next week, Casoli said.
When the job is done, it will take two to three weeks to pack up all the equipment and move on, Libby said. She said the Illinois is not currently booked for another job.
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