Needless tragedies costing a lot more than fixing hillside

Talk about waiting for the other rock to drop.
In just minutes of research, we documented a long list of incidents of boulders and debris thundering onto Monongahela Boulevard off the hillside above it since 1983.
That’s not including the latest incident when a pickup-truck-size boulder struck a vehicle and a PRT car, injuring three people on Feb. 10.
It’s apparent that disagreements on what needs to be done have stymied efforts to find a solution for decades and the question who’s responsible. But what does everyone agree on?
Morgantown’s luck can only last so long before someone is killed and something has to be done.
When will the state Division of Highways, the city, the county and WVU decide that enough is enough and do whatever’s necessary to secure the hillside?
Though the most recent boulder was bigger than a compact car, in the past some slabs of rock have weighed in at 100 tons along with thousands of cubic yards of debris.
One 1989 slide, that closed the road for days, came while DOH workers were trying to blast a huge rock off the hill, but it fell on its own as the last charge was being placed.
Considered the worst incident so far, it wound up blocking all four lanes of the roadway. The state had to blast it apart before hauling it away.
Crews attempted to cut away loose rock after a 1993 landslide moved enough dirt to cover Mountaineer Field to a depth of about 4 feet.
Clearly, the 200-foot hillside looming above Monongahela Boulevard is more susceptible to slides at this time of the year and on into spring.
Because of the alternate freezing and thawing of water and the spates of constant rainfall for days — that marks winter and spring — this hillside becomes unstable.
As of Friday afternoon, nobody had been killed, but in last Monday’s incident and another in February 1997, people were seriously injured.
Though we are not ones for fueling panic, it’s obvious it’s only a matter of time before a tragedy happens that claims someone’s life or even a number of lives.
If anyone is hedging their bets on this week’s weather or any other week to ensure this hillside is safe again, that’s no comfort at all. There is no season when this hillside will be safe until we take action.
Far be it from us to tell anyone what the solution is. We are not engineers, geologists or hydrologists.
But we do know some of the best engineers, geologists and hydrologists in all of West Virginia work, teach and live right here among us in Morgantown.
There needs to be a meeting of these minds, including the DOH and local public officials, on this tragedy-waiting-to- happen immediately.
A needless, terrible tragedy will cost far more than repairing that hillside.