Man, I can’t wait. I hope they get what’s coming to them in enough time for those living below this giant pre-failure catastrophe-in-waiting.
Well that didn't take long.... new article this afternoon.
http://www.catholic.org/news/green/story.php?id=74779
Article excerpt: = =
LOS ANGELES, CA (California Network) - Oroville Dam may be facing a breach danger from a serious and a dangerous form of a slow motion failure mode of the left abutment of the dam [3]. Recently, authorities to the dam have responded to the public stating "its a natural spring", or "the green spot is from rain". Yet, outside of a public forum, DWR asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to move a test drill well near the leakage to try to get answers in 2016. If it's known to be a harmless "natural spring" or from "rain" why drill? Why hasn't DWR publicly announced that they have a "test well" near the leakage area, which they noted to FERC, quote "data collected may be beneficial in understanding seepage"?[1] However, DWR's recent town hall meeting's answers, by DWR engineers and representatives, do not stand up to honest engineering scrutiny. The public deserves an honest technical risk assessment of this known dam failure mode threat [9].
Analysis of DWR's town hall answers reveals conflicts in engineering fluid flow hydraulics. The OrovilleMR News [2] reported "'The green spot is from rain, said Christy Jones, deputy director of statewide emergency preparedness and security for DWR.' - 'When the rain falls, the grass grows. There is no leak in the dam,' she said."
If the cause was from "rain", then downhill erosion channels should be uniform above, below, and along the face of the dam. Yet it is not. The notable downhill erosion channels originate exclusively at the Green Wet Area (See Fig 2). This answer implies that rainfall somehow concentrates at the Green Wet Area. DWR's answer, inferring that the wispy greening of the rest of the dam means that the intense and much larger growth of the vegetation in the Green Wet Area is from the same "rain fall" - is not supportable. Only a concentration of an internal source of a particular volume of water leakage at the Green Wet Area would support the visible downhill erosion channels.
Another DWR public town hall statement, from a DWR engineer, was "it's a natural spring" - i.e. causing the Green Wet Area. Yet, precise elevation markings of the near perfect horizontal progression of the Green Wet Area, away from the dam hillside abutment, defies this explanation. In fact, the horizontal elevation of the greening increases in elevation further away from the abutment (See Fig 2). Water does not flow uphill. If there were to be a natural spring, emitting water from within the left abutment hillside, there would be a downward curvature to any greening that would follow the hillside topography. It does not.
So why are reputable DWR engineers and representatives giving answers that are easily refuted? Worse, these answers infer a demonstration of a lack of engineering competency. Yet, these provably "flawed" engineering answers are the basis of reassuring the public that "There is no leak in the dam". With such a magnitude of risk from a known & dangerous dam failure mechanism, how can representatives state to concerned public citizens, of a certainty of "there is no leak in the dam" when they give flawed answers?
= = end excerpt