Family of Memorial Bridge Worker Shares Float Out

Archer Western Contractors and the sub-contractors they hired to separate the Memorial Bridge lift span so it could be transported to Boston on Wednesday worked several 18 hours days and endured their share of hardships.

Their families also make a great deal of sacrifices that come with the rigors of the successful completion of the $81.9 million Memorial Bridge replacement project.

On Wednesday morning, Michelle Downs, her three daughters and two younger children she babysits gathered at Prescott Park in Portsmouth to support Joshua Downs, her husband.

Downs said he has had to work a lot of long days and nights throughout January and February and even some 18-hour days so that the Memorial Bridge lift span could be successfully separated from the bridge and floated by barge to Massachusetts on Wednesday. But she said she and their children believe it has been worth it.

"It's been very exciting for him to be able to do something like that," she said.

Joshua Downs was working on the barge on Wednesday morning and helped secure lines from the tugboats that eventually transported the lift span out of Portsmouth Harbor. Michelle Downs said her husband has been in the construction business for 15 years, but never worked on any project quite like the Memorial Bridge.

She said her husband was on the barge when the lift span was initially floated out on the night of Feb. 1, but will not make the 18-hour trip from Portsmouth to the Greater Boston area this week. He even got to spend a nice weekend at home with his family before returning to work on Monday, Michelle Downs said.

She said the family is also grateful for the steady work that his project provides. She said Joshua Downs will be working on the Memorial Bridge as it is dismantled, but not on the bridge replacement portion of the project.

When she and her three daughters, Daisy, 8, Jordan, 11, and Torie, 13 along with Kaden Coffin, 2, and Brady Phillips, 1, the two children she babysits, got to see the Memorial Bridge lift span float down the Piscataqua River along with the hundreds of other people on hand, they witnessed not only an unforgettable piece of Portsmouth history, but also the fruit of their father's hard labors.