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Race to save badly damaged California dam before MORE rainfall: Second storm is set to hit the tallest dam in America in 48 hours and could cause devastating 100ft deep flood that will leave 200,000 homeless  Authorities have said they want to lower the water level by at least 50 feet before storms arrive Wednesday There are fears the Oroville Dam could collapse and unleash flooding, leaving towns 100 foot underwaterNearly 200,000 residents evacuated in Butte, Sutter and Yuba counties in Northern California amid fearsThe average annual rainfall is about 31 inches, but since October, the area has seen 25 inches...

To make sense of the fast-developing situation at California's Oroville Dam, Chris spoke today with Scott Cahill, an expert with 40 years of experience on large construction and development projects on hundreds of dams, many of them earthen embankment ones like the dam at Oroville. Scott has authored numerous white papers on dam management, he's a FEMA trainer for dam safety, and is the current owner of Watershed Services of Ohio which specializes in dam projects across the eastern US. Suffice it to say, he knows his "dam" stuff. Scott and Chris talk about the physics behind the failing spillways...

UPDATE: Drone video over spillway added.Collapse of emergency spillway expected, evacuation orderedDepartment of Water Resources officials say they expect the emergency spillway at Oroville Dam to fail, and say residents should evacuate northward.The emergency spillway suffered erosion and could fail, according to DWR. If that happens, the water behind that barrier will comedown the hill and down the river.Flow through the broken main spillway was increased to 100,000 cubic feet per second in an effort to lower the water level in the lake more rapidly.The Butte County Sheriff’s Office reports helicopters will be depositing rock-filled containers to strengthen the potential...

No, humans cannot make it rain, stop the rain, or produce real rainbows in the sky. But we can do things that protect ourselves from the rain and get it to work for our agriculture and overall economy. And it's clearer than ever that Californians have simply failed to do those things as the Oroville Dam crisis continues to force massive evacuations and raises fears of a potential disaster. When we talk about America's need for an improved and repaired infrastructure, we usually focus on roads, airports, and innovative new projects like the Hyperloop. But we often forget the crucial...

California Gov. Jerry Brown, appealing to the Trump administration for direct federal assistance on the Oroville Dam’s emergency spillway, said Monday that he remains encouraged that the state and federal government can work constructively.

OROVILLE, Calif. (KCRA) — Crews are beginning to make repairs to the spillways at Lake Oroville, the California Department of Water Resources said. “Efforts are underway to make repairs to both the primary and auxiliary spillways at Lake Oroville,” officials tweeted. Military-grade helicopters are picking up 1-ton containers of rocks from a parking lot near Lake Oroville, flying them to the erosion scar at the emergency spillway and dropping the containers into the hole.

Federal and state officials have a lot to answer for in the wake of the Oroville Dam fiasco. They decided in 2005 to ignore warnings that the massive earthen spillway adjacent to the dam itself could erode during heavy winter rains — which it has done — and cause a calamity, which it very nearly did this week and could yet do by the end of this winter. No less to blame are the water agencies, including the powerful Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, which argued that paying for the upgrades a decade ago was unnecessary. The 180,000 people...

Amature video shot today close to the dam.

A California dam threatened by a damaged emergency spillway has operated under temporary licenses for a decade. A spokeswoman for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission says a 50-year license for Oroville Dam, the nation's tallest, expired in January 2007. Mary O'Driscoll told The Associated Press that the facility has been operating under an existing license that's renewed each year. The California Department of Water Resources, which operates the dam, applied for a new 50-year license in 2005. O'Driscoll said the federal agency finally received all the necessary permits and other documents needed to decide on the new license last December....

Ten years ago, for the 40th anniversary of the Dec. 14, 1963 Baldwin Hills Dam collapse, Los Angeles Times staff writer Bob Pool reported: The Baldwin Hills Dam collapsed with the fury of a thousand cloudbursts, sending a 50-foot wall of water down Cloverdale Avenue and slamming into homes and cars on Dec. 14, 1963. Five people were killed. Sixty-five hillside houses were ripped apart, and 210 homes and apartments were damaged. The flood swept northward in a V-shaped path roughly bounded by La Brea Avenue and Jefferson and La Cienega boulevards. The earthen dam that created a 19-acre reservoir...

Nearly 200,000 people remained under evacuation orders Monday as California authorities try to fix erosion of the emergency spillway at the nation's tallest dam that could unleash uncontrolled flood waters if it fails. About 150 miles northeast of San Francisco, Lake Oroville - one of California's largest man-made lakes - had water levels so high that an emergency spillway was used Saturday for the first time in almost 50 years. The evacuation was ordered Sunday afternoon after engineers spotted a hole on the concrete lip of the secondary spillway for the 770-foot-tall Oroville Dam and told authorities that it could...

I have heard that the emergency spillway is eroding through cutback. This will be an evolutionary erosive failure. It will take some time for the cut back. Hopefully the erosion will be stopped at bedrock, However, I fear that if the erosion of the emergency spillway, on the canted bedrock of the abutment communicates with the hydraulics of the principal spillway, this may result in a V notch failure. This would be the most serious type of failure.

"Officials are anticipating a failure of the Auxiliary Spillway at Oroville Dam within the next 60 minutes (5:45 p.m.)," the California Department of Water Resources said on Facebook. The Yuba County Office of Emergency Services said on Facebook an evacuation has been for "all Yuba County on the valley floor." The city of Marysville and Yuba County have been ordered to evacuate, the Marysville Police Department tweeted.

OROVILLE — Immediate evacuations have been ordered for residents of the low levels of Oroville and areas downstream, according to officials with the California Department of Water Resources. Officials say a hazardous situation is developing with the Oroville Dam auxiliary spillway. The operation of the auxiliary spillway has led to severe erosion that could lead to a failure of the auxiliary spillway. Officials are anticipating a failure of the auxiliary spillway at Oroville Dam within the next 60 minutes.

The Butte County Sheriff’ Office released the following statement on Facebook: This is an evacuation order. Immediate evacuation from the low levels of Oroville and areas downstream is ordered. A hazardous situation is developing with the Oroville Dam auxiliary spillway. Operation of the auxiliary spillway has lead to severe erosion that could lead to a failure of the structure. Failure of the auxiliary spillway structure will result in an uncontrolled release of flood waters from Lake Oroville.In response to this developing situation, DWR is increasing water releases to 100,000 cubic feet per second. Immediate evacuation from the low levels of...

<p>OROVILLE, Calif. - An immediate evacuation from the low levels of Oroville and areas downstream is ordered.</p> <p>A hazardous situation has developed with the Oroville Dam auxiliary spillway. Officials say that operation of the auxiliary spillway has lead to severe erosion that could lead to a failure of the structure.</p>

Officials say water has begun flowing over the emergency spillway at Lake Oroville for the first time since it opened in 1968 in Northern California's Butte County. A spokesman for California's Department of Water Resources says water began flowing over the emergency spillway around 8 a.m. Saturday. Officials had been hoping to avoid using the emergency spillway because it could cause trees to fall

State water officials said water has begun flowing over the emergency spillway at Oroville Dam. Doug Carlson, a spokesman for the state Department of Water Resources, said water started topping over the auxiliary spillway shortly before 8 a.m. at a rate of between 5,000 and 10,000 cubic feet per second.

"OROVILLE, Calif. - An immediate evacuation from the low levels of Oroville and areas downstream is ordered. A hazardous situation has developed with the Oroville Dam emergency spillway. Officials say that operation of the auxiliary spillway has lead to severe erosion that could lead to a failure of the structure. Failure of the emergency spillway structure will result in an uncontrolled release of flood waters from Lake Oroville. ... Officials are anticipating a failure of the auxiliary spillway at Oroville Dam within the next 60 minutes ..."

Update, 7:15 p.m. Thursday: The situation surrounding the damaged spillway at Oroville Dam has escalated into a crisis, with state water managers hoping they can dump enough water down the badly compromised structure to prevent the state’s second-largest reservoir from pouring over an emergency release point that has never been used before. Flow rates down the collapsing spillway were increased late Thursday morning to 35,000 cubic feet per second. The result was a spectacle of churning mud and water and the further damage to the concrete structure. [snip] Officials at the media briefing repeated further reassurances that the integrity of...