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Oops....damn dams

Posted: Wed May 20, 2020 1:04 am
by Butcher Bob
Or....How my brother lost his lake house.


So, we've been getting a little rain lately. :???: But some back story first...

Aboot 25 years ago, my brother bought a lake house. As part of the process, he had to have a flood evaluation done in order to get the mortgage. It's not a regular lake, it's a reservoir. He tried to point out to the bank folk that his house would never flood, because the dam creating the lake would breech before that happened, and it would be the folks down stream that would need to worry aboot flooding. They didn't care, they made him pay for the evaluation anyways. And apparently we like to put these things in series on a single water way...because there is another reservoir down stream, and yet another up stream.

So, we've been getting a little rain lately...and in anticipation of higher water levels, all three dams have had their spillways fully open. That by itself means flood conditions for anything down stream. But today, things went from bad to worse. Earlier this afternoon, the dam 12 miles up stream breeched...



The water at bro's house came to 4' below his foundation level.

Then the dam on his lake breeched...



You can see what that meant for folks down stream...



Here's video from one of those down stream bridges...



The next dam, 7 miles down stream, looked like this, BEFORE the breechs...



The spillways are already causing major flooding. Now they say this dam's breech is imminent.

Further down stream is Midland, home of the famous tridge...that's right, tridge, a three legged bridge. And BEFORE the breeches, it looked like this...



You couldn't even get to the fukking thing without a boat.

I grew up in Midland. The neighborhoods I lived in have been evacuated. After Midland comes Saginaw, and then Bay City, before dumping into the Saginaw Bay on lake Huron.


So while my brother didn't lose the house, he did lose the lake. It is now a giant mud puddle with a river running through it.:p

Oops....damn dams

Posted: Wed May 20, 2020 9:27 am
by Intrinsic


History shows again and again
How nature points out the folly of man
Godzilla!

Oops....damn dams

Posted: Wed May 20, 2020 1:09 pm
by rSin
Heard of the tridge but
Had never seen it...

Thanks bob!

All that muds going to make
A Great place to start a farm

Dams are going away
And in light of their true lifetime costs

And few will be replaced

Oops....damn dams

Posted: Wed May 20, 2020 3:36 pm
by rSin
You made the NPR news!

Two dams breached near midland
And significant flood waters intermingling with
Chemical retention pond water...

Oops....damn dams

Posted: Wed May 20, 2020 4:03 pm
by Butcher Bob
The first dam breech wasn't even covered by the news. :rolleyes: It appears for the most part that breech was overflow, but no real structural failure. Except for the hydro turbine building, which looks like they were already working on before this happened.

The second dam breech was structural failure. It is privately owned, and the owner has been in a court battle with the state and the power company for the last several years. He is sooo fuk'd now. The state wanted him to increase discharge capacity, and he was refusing.

The third dam breech happened aboot an hour after the second. So far they know it overflowed, but it is unknown if the structural integrity was compromised.

This morning @ 6:20 notice went out of a levy failure in Midland...couple thousand more acres flooded.

A friend lives across the lake from my brother's place. This was evidently too much for him. Water was up to his doorway. He had already put his dock and boat in. As the water rose, the boat started pulling the dock anchors out of the ground...so he was out tying the boat and dock to a tree to keep them from floating away. He called 911 and was taken to the hospital...still in his waders...just before the road in was closed.

My nephew was sent up yesterday to check on the house. He said the power was out, so he was going to come home. Bro told him no way...no power means no sump pump, so he needed to stay and monitor it.

These dams will all be fixed, because they all have hydro power generators. Not to mention the thousands of vacation homes on these lakes that would lose most of their value.

I have several friends with property on these lakes...some vacation homes, some full time residents. From the videos I can tell at least two were flooded out. Going to be a hell of a mess up there all summer.

Oh yeah, I forgot aboot that...Midland is home for Dow Chemical. Probably all kinds of nasty shit for folks down stream.

Oops....damn dams

Posted: Wed May 20, 2020 5:29 pm
by rSin
Seems you streched the defination of breach and
failure

Oops....damn dams

Posted: Wed May 20, 2020 8:42 pm
by ripper5
Unreal how often extreme weather has systematically changed the lives of so many extra folks...
https://youtu.be/fOEQTJV_3-w" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Oops....damn dams

Posted: Thu May 21, 2020 12:28 am
by Butcher Bob
My understanding is breeched is when the dam can't contain the water, and failure is when parts of it start ending up down stream...no?


My friend who went to the hospital is back home and doing fine. He's a tough old fukker, but he's been having heart issues for the past year, and when it's looking like you might lose the home that's been in the family for the last 60 years...well... At least he was lucky, the house was spared any damage...just barely.

Other folks weren't so lucky...they lost their homes. And I don't mean destroyed by flooding. I mean LOST...as in no longer there...



Plenty of other things gone as well...like the bridge in yesterday's clip...



...and an entire lake...



To give you an idea of the size of the lake, it covered 1980 acres, had 84 miles of shoreline, and was up to 40' deep.

While their flood threat is over, the next dam down stream is not as fortunate. It has failed as well...almost the entire dam is gone. And water levels are still peaking...



Though not as big, it still covers 1500 acres, up to 26' deep, and 35 miles of shoreline.

Down stream, Midland was expected to crest tonight.

A station out of Detroit had some pretty good footage...even if their reporting wasn't entirely accurate...



They were saying the Sanford dam was still intact, just breeched...but their video footage showed otherwise. :p

Oops....damn dams

Posted: Fri May 22, 2020 4:06 pm
by Butcher Bob
Another levy failure...this time on the Cass river just south of Saginaw, right before it joins the Titabawassee river going into Saginaw.

Weather forcast this morning is predicting 60% chance of rain today, clear tomorrow, and then 50/50 chance of thunderstorms for each of the 6 days following that. The folks around the dams will be safe, but Midland, Saginaw, and Bay City will be at risk, because this series of dams were put in to control flooding in those cities.

Oops....damn dams

Posted: Fri May 22, 2020 6:19 pm
by rSin
The dow property is a superfund site

Dioxen...