BEND, OR -- Highway 97 will close for about 15 minutes, between 7 and 8 Sunday morning near the northbound Empire on-ramp. “It's in between the Empire on ramp and 97. So the northbound on-ramp on to Empire at 97 right in that little corner there,” ODOT’s Kasey Davey says crews picked this low-traffic time to blast a deep layer of hard basalt rock, “It's actually safer and more efficient to do it than drilling, which would take a really long time. But when you think of a blast, you know, and dirt flying through the air, it's actually going to be pretty uneventful. We're expecting a little poof of dust, maybe the ground to lift up a little bit. We know it could cause a little bit of a backup. But the reason we're doing it this early in the morning on Sunday is because that's one of the lowest traffic volume times for us.”

It's part of the Bend North Corridor Project, building the new segment of Highway 97 from Empire to Grandview Drive. “We do have to do about four or five more of these in the next month or so. So, we're going to do this and evaluate the impact it actually has to traffic. And if the timing like in the weekend and in the morning works well and then we'll let everyone know before we do any more blasts,” Davey says, adding crews have been working day and night. “This project is on schedule and it's a really big project to deliver and it should be done by the end of the year, which is just amazing and we're so, so happy for that.”

Flaggers and detour signs will be in place Sunday morning while the highway is closed.