Friday 10 September 2010

Abundant Rains Stress Dam

Most years, the rivers around here are very low in late summer and fall. This year we have had plenty of rain in the North Central states much of the summer. Even in September there are flooding concerns.

As an example, when I was in New Ulm on Saturday, they talked about the Minnesota River coming up another seven feet in the next few days. And it was already high. There had been recent rains upstream.

On Monday in a state park, I walked across a dam that had washed out in a recent year. That day it held.

In my travels, I learned of another town concerned about their local dam nearby. It was looking a bit vulnerable.

When my son David becomes a civil engineer, he can educate me more about dams. But it seems most of the smaller ones have similar designs. Each end of the dam is L-shaped with one leg downstream to support the vertical middle section.

In this case, the end pieces are cracking and showing signs of weakness. If those L-shaped segments fail, the whole dam could collapse and release a flood. That could be catastrophic for people downstream.

They don’t have many funds available for repairs. They aren’t entirely sure what to do with all the high water. It sounded like they were waiting for some kind of wealthy Prince Charming to come in and save the day. After all, this truly is a dam’s L in distress.


Full disclosure: I made up the part about the dam cracking just to use the pun. But the rest is true.

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