““The Oroville Dam is to be soaked by a foot of rain by Tuesday, ramping up the pressure on engineers who are frantically trying to repair ‘patch and pray’ quick-fixes which led to its near-collapse last week.””
I am not going to say that this whole issue isn’t serious, but any suggestion that the dam itself is in danger is really a stretch. The area where the emergency spillway is located has a concrete cap. There is concern that if it were to fail the lake might drop as much as 30 feet all at once, but not the whole lake! Right now the lake has been drawn down about 50 feet, so all the water is going out the main spillway. The real issue is what will the coming rains bring? As long as they can release as much water as is flowing in, everything will work out. If the emergency spillway is topped again, that’s when there could be a problem.
Here’s the NOAA Forecast. Take a look:
Looks as though there could be 6 inches of rain. That’s a bunch as the Lake Oroville Watershed is huge.
That 30 foot is only a quarter of a TRILLION pounds of water due to the size of the lake. Can’t imagine it would do anything to the impoundment with already an exposed history of rotten rock. As it moves downstream it might move an item or two in its way.
Now, I will concede that we do not know that it will happen. We only surmise that it may happen. I don’t think I am going to dine in one of those charming River front Restaurants on the North side of Sacramento on Wednesday or Thursday.
Thank you, very much, for that information.
Just checked the weather for that area - it’s rain today; Monday; and, Tuesday.
Hoping for the best news.
The main spillway has been damaged. Yet it must continue to discharge massive amounts of water. If the damage to it continues & starts working its way back up the dam, its operators must slow or stop using the main spillway.
At this point the entire dam is at risk. The concrete cap on the emergency spillway is close to being undermined. Video clearly shows this. Once that collapses the entire dam is at risk & there is NOTHING anyone can do but stand by & watch.
This dam was never designed to withstand all the potential mountain runoff. CA never finished the water projects that would have built upstream dams which would have controlled what water arrived at Oroville dam as well as other dams (Shasta).
Beyond the extreme risk to life & property, much the water flooding people’s homes, flowing to the sea could have been retained by those unbuilt dams, which could have provided the water for a revival of central valley agriculture & end water usage restrictions, greening CA again & thereby absorbing tons of that evil CO2.