Article

2017-02-10 -Signs, Portents, and the Weather-

Oroville Dam in California Has Some Problems caused by too much rain

[SFGate] Story update Feb. 10 at 7 a.m.: The massive crater in the main spillway of Oroville Dam continued to grow Thursday as state officials released more water from Lake Oroville to keep up with the stormwater and snowmelt filling up the reservoir. The hole is now about 45-feet-deep and 300-feet-wide by 500-feet-long, according to KCBS.

As the lake level continues to rise, officials are saying they'll likely release water from Oroville Dam's unpaved emergency spillway for the first time ever on Saturday. The emergency release has never been used, and crews are clearing trees and brush if it's needed.

The lake is now at 98 percent capacity
[It has never been this high at this point in the year - it has also never overtopped the dam but it may do so in the next few days - although the Dam will not collapse].
Earlier this week, chunks of concrete flew off the nearly mile-long spillway, creating a 200-foot-long, 30-foot-deep hole. Engineers don't know what caused the cave-in that is expected to keep growing until it reaches bedrock
[probably a design error when the Dam was built or else a construction error same time frame].
The department does not expect the discharge from the reservoir to exceed the capacity of any channel downstream as the water flows through the Feather River, into the Sacramento River and on to the San Francisco Bay.

To keep track of the Reservoir situation in California go here.

To keep track of this year's good news for the Salt Lake City water basin go here.

To keep track of this year's good news for the Lake Powell and other Colorado River Reservoirs go here.

Posted by lord garth 2017-02-10 12:25|| || Front Page|| [10 views ] Top

#1 The emergency release has never been used, and crews are clearing trees and brush if it's needed.

Given the size of the hole, this doesn't sound all that necessary. Unless it's needed to keep the trees and debris from floating downstream and hitting things. Maybe I'm missing something?

Posted by gorb 2017-02-10 15:56|| 2017-02-10 15:56|| Front Page Top

#2 Welcome to the Dam Tour...

Posted by Crusader 2017-02-10 16:23|| 2017-02-10 16:23|| Front Page Top

#3 If not for the water, it would be an excellent structure.

Posted by Besoeker 2017-02-10 16:31|| 2017-02-10 16:31|| Front Page Top

#4 Wait! What happened to the never ending drought that I was told about due to Gerbil Worming?

Posted by AlanC 2017-02-10 18:04|| 2017-02-10 18:04|| Front Page Top

#5 CA hasn't built a dam in 30 plus years. In that time the population has doubled, thanks in part to the presence of 1/3 of all the 11-15 million illegals in the whole country. All this water, the liquid bounty that could prevent the drought conditions returning in a year or so, flows into the Pacific. So they are already anticipating water delivery restrictions to agriculture and cities perhaps as early as this year. The state is spending billions on the Bullet Train fiasco and electic car charging stations, but not a dime on water storage or catchment basins. We are governed by idiots and simpletons like Moonbeam.

Posted by NoMoreBS 2017-02-10 19:02|| 2017-02-10 19:02|| Front Page Top

#6 Mods, the three links URLs at bottom of article need fixing, please remove "rantburg.com" and quotation marks from link URLs.

Doing it manually on my part, the links works.

Thanks

Posted by Seeking cure for ignorance 2017-02-10 20:27|| 2017-02-10 20:27|| Front Page Top

#7 Seeking cure for ignorance, I removed the quotes Fred's icon automatically places around the URL, which fixed the problem for me. Please check to make sure it now works for you as well.

Many thanks for the feedback!

Posted by trailing wife 2017-02-10 21:55|| 2017-02-10 21:55|| Front Page Top

#8 The links are working for me now. Much thanks!

Posted by Seeking cure for ignorance 2017-02-10 23:17|| 2017-02-10 23:17|| Front Page Top

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