Damming News From Washington State 168
Trax3001BBS writes "A 65-foot (20-meter) crack has been found in Wanapum Dam, one of the major dams along the Columbia River in southern Washington. Water levels are being lowered to both reduce water pressure and give the inspectors access to the area. 'Earlier this week, an engineer noticed a slight irregular "bowing" above the spillway gates near where cars can drive across the dam. When divers finally took a look under water they found a 2-inch-wide crack that stretched for 65 feet along the base of one of the dam's spillway piers.' The article goes on to say, 'Even if the dam doesn't fail, the significance of the damage is likely to require extensive repairs and that, too, could impact the entire Columbia River system. "All these dams coordinate to generate energy on a regional scope," Stedwick said. "If Wanapum is impacted, that has impacts on dams upstream as well as below." Upstream dams would be required to handle more water; there's only one lower dam (Priest Rapids). After that is the last free flowing section of the Columbia river. I've taken walks along that section, and I've seen it deviate (higher or lower) by amazing amount of water, so it can handle the changing flow rate. Making this situation more complex, a large group of people would like that particular dam removed, as well as the one above and below it (think of the fish!). On top of that, after the Priest Rapids dam (downstream from Wanapum Dam) is the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, once a site for Plutonium production. Either of these issues could generate a ton of attention. Personally, I'd like to give the engineer that noticed a slight irregular 'bowing' my congratulations."
could've been huge. hydro failure killed 200,000 (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm sure glad they caught it. China has a similar series of hydroelectric dams. A failure caused a domino effect and when the Banquai dam failed it killed 200,000 people. I know TFA says the failure of this one dam wouldn't kill that many people, but that assumes the sudden tidal-wave-like flood doesn't effect the downstream dams. A domino failure on the Columbia river would be a catastrophe.
Re:dams down river (Score:2, Interesting)
You're correct. This is an "issue" because it's standard BR procedure, and all federal entities must be notified for this. SOP...
This is not a major problem right now, as it could be solved pretty easily. However, 24 miles downstream is the Hanford area, which borders 520 sq. miles of variously polluted soil. A sudden breach of Wanapum could cause a breach of Priest Rapids dam (~10 miles away) and flood the Hanford area, which has small areas of high radioactive contamination, the likes of which are part of a $2 billion/yr effort to clean. This area is generally a plain, with high features (White Bluffs) as it moves towards the Reach, to move water towards Hanford. The breach could spread flooding into these areas, which the US DOE hasn't accurately modeled. The other problem is the Tri-Cities, only 15 miles further downstream. 250,000 people...Their water supply is in danger.
There is no likely danger of this happening.
I grew up worrying this same thing, if the Grand Coulee failed.
Re:William Mulholland didn't take action (Score:4, Interesting)
It's almost certain that the foundation on the west end of the dam had already been fatally compromised and the cracks were a symptom of the impending failure rather than the cause.
Could the same not be true in this case as well? Even if the dam is irreparably damaged, this will at least hopefully give enough warning to relieve the pressure or in the worst case scenario, evacuate the immediate down-stream area.