New Well Drilled At Top Shop

Well-drillers from Braswell Drilling set up equipment in the parking lot next to the Mile High Swinging Bridge this December with the mission of increasing the amount of water available to the summit Visitor Center.

Grandfather’s existing well, dropped 800 feet through solid granite in the early 1950s, produces about 1/2 gallon per minute. Another well located near the Hiker parking lot supplies an additional 25 gallons of water per minute for the visitor center, but because the pipe going from that well to the Top Shop runs above ground, it must be drained in winter.

The new well is estimated to bring in three gallons per minute.

“We'll be having the water tested in the near future,” said Jim Morton, a member of Grandfather’s Board of Directors. “That will give us a better idea of what the possibilities are.”

When the first well was sunk in the 1950s, the equipment used basically pounded a hole 800 feet into the rock using a 4-inch bore. The 21st century equipment actually drilled a hole 1,200 feet into the peak using a 6-inch bore.

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