Oroville Dam

GLG

Well-Known Member
Not sure if anyone has been watching this developing issue of our friends down south. They have been having problem with the spillway at the Oroville Dam. It just took a turn for the worse.


http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-oroville-update-20170212-story.html

Residents of Oroville and nearby towns were ordered to immediately evacuate on Sunday afternoon after a “hazardous situation” developed involving an emergency spillway at the Oroville Dam.

The National Weather Service said the auxiliary spillway at the Oroville Dam was expected to fail by 5:45 p.m., which could send an “uncontrolled release of flood waters from Lake Oroville.”
 
Live on youtube

 
Thanks for sharing, wasn't on the news I just watched. I don't know all the details but it seems like they waited too long to start the dumping. I guess it kinda shows us the importance of upgrading and maintaining 50 year old infrastructure.
 
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They have been dumping water for days/week or more.......... as much as they can. They had the a break in the runoff on the main spillway a few days ago and erosion next to the runoff about 3/4 of the way down. They are getting more water than they can dump and the emergency spillway next to it has kicked in as the last resort. They prepped the area by logging and putting fastset concrete on the toe of the emergency spillway to help stop any erosion on that emergency spillway. This is what is failing and they fear that it will let go. That would send a wall of water down and flood the area. The dam itself is in no danger as it's in bedrock so if the emergency spillway lets go that's bad but not a complete disaster like it would be if the dam let go.
 
Trusted source update from last night 7:40 PM

 
They were on it........
Published on Feb 10, 2017
Aerial video of the hatchery and Feather River as flows were increased because of a very full lake upstream. Feather River Hatchery raises Chinook salmon and steelhead along the Feather River, just below Lake Oroville. The Department of Fish and Wildlife moved about 4 million small salmon and steelhead from the due to the dirty water resulting from the erosion around the spillway.

 
Have any officials said "with climate change models we didn't expect the rain" yet? If not it will come once this is over, they have the get out of jail free card.
 
It's not a climate change issue on this one ..... it's an engineering issue. The dams main spillway is designed to flow 200k cubic feet per second but at that rate you get flooding and damage downstream. They were flowing it at around 100k cubic feet per second when last week the main spillway developed a washout. They cut it back to 50k cubic feet per second to decrease the damage that was occurring. The lake rose and they were going to use the secondary spillway as planned. That did not work out as the secondary spillway had erosion at the foot of the base that could have compromised the wall. They went back to flowing the main (damaged) spillway back to 100k cubic feet per second till they can lower the lake level by 50 feet the get to work fixing the problems.
 
They can all go home now.
Let's hope they get it fixed soon.

Can't say they weren't warned. Going to be a big bill.
 
on the bright side they are getting all the rain they have been deprived of for quit some time.
 
It's not a climate change issue on this one

I completely agree but would still bet when it's over and answers are due they'll play the "the precipitation volume was higher than ever predicted due to climate change" card.
 

I should have know that this was not going to turn out well when I saw that url ...... this from the article.

“Seven years of great abundance are coming throughout the land of Egypt, but seven years of famine will follow them.” Joseph

Why were Pharaoh’s wise men unable to anticipate the seven year long bounty and seven year famine that Joseph interpreted and predicted? After six years of “perpetual” drought, California is now deluged with the highest precipitation for January and February on human record. Have dam designers, regulators, and climate modelers fully grappled with the “climate persistence” that Joseph warned of and planned for?

FYI the writer using the bible in his argument is not helping his case but then that's to be expected from that url.
 
new video from a trusted source.
 
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