By Nicholas Brown
Staff Writer

While Epsom residents soundly voiced a desire to see the Suncook River return to its former course, state environmental officials said months of studies are needed to determine a plan.

“You have to look at what’s best for the river overall,” said the state Department of Environmental Services river coordinator, Steve Couture.

When asked by residents at a Monday, June 5, selectmen’s meeting when state officials may offer a recommendation on the Suncook, Couture said “within the year,” if state and local agencies can find funding for research.

Couture described that as a “snapshot” in geological time, to which Epsom resident Bruce Graham replied, “You deal in geological time. We don’t.”

Graham was one of about 45 residents packed into the town offices along with numerous state environmental workers and members of the media. All were focused on a geographical oddity unprecedented in New Hampshire.

Beginning Monday, May 15, the Suncook overcame its banks about a quarter-mile south of Route 4, and began to fill a gravel pit. The effect was odd, said DES hydrogeologist Chad Wittkop.

“The river was pulled out of its channel, it didn’t push out of its channel,” he said.

Once the gravel pit filled, the river again breached and forged through a new channel before eventually returning to itself about one-and-a-half miles down river from the initial breach.

Wittkop said the initial breach was likely due to a combination of manmade erosion from the active sand and gravel pit, and the idea that, “The river has probably been working its way at this ridge for the last 1,000 years.”

“It’s serendipity that the gravel pit was there,” he said. “It’s kind of guilt by association.”

Though no homes were destroyed due to the new course, its effects have cause problems for business owners and residents north and south of the river bypass, and those situated along what is now a vacated riverbed.

Wittkop said the river’s new path, which bypasses two dams, is following a gradient of 23 feet per mile, compared to its former gradient of 16 feet per mile.

Epsom Fire Chief Stewart Yeaton said he’s worried about sinking river levels north of the breach, near the Route 4 traffic circle. He said residents near there, including those at a 180-bed elderly home, require water in the Suncook for fire protection.

“I just worry it may not be deep enough in August or September for us to draft out of,” said Yeaton.

Other residents voiced worries about homes off Blackhall Road, after one of two wells that supplies water to about 300 residents was washed out during the May flooding, said resident Kevin Reeves.

A Pembroke resident, Tom Baumeister, said he’s expecting $20,000 to $25,000 in personal damage, as loads of sand from the gravel and sand pit are being deposited on his property.

The Suncook’s change also has some serious ecological implications, DES officials said.

Couture said about 1,100 brook floater mussels ­ an Atlantic coast mollusk on the New Hampshire endangered species list ­ have been temporarily salvaged from the vacated riverbed.

“The population is the most significant (the state) has come across,” he said.

New Hampshire Fish and Game representative and Epsom resident Eric Orff said representatives from his department plan to research water quality and test ecological conditions for the river’s inhabitants, like the mussels and fish.

“We have more questions than answers, and it probably will be that way for some time,” said Orff.