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Thread: Thousands told to leave their homes near huge California dam

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    Default Thousands told to leave their homes near huge California dam

    OROVILLE, Calif. (AP) — Thousands of northern Californians were told to leave their homes Sunday evening, as an emergency spillway in the country's tallest dam was in danger of failing and unleashing uncontrolled flood waters on towns below

    The emergency spillway of the Oroville Dam in Northern California could fail within an hour unleashing uncontrolled flood waters from Lake Oroville, the California Department of Water Resources said on Sunday afternoon.

    People in downstream areas need to leave the area immediately, the department said.

    Officials earlier Sunday stressed the dam was structurally sound and said there was no threat to the public.

    Residents of Oroville, a town of 16,000 people, should head north toward Chico, and other cities should follow orders from their local law enforcement agencies, the Butte County Sheriff's office said.

    The Yuba County Office of Emergency Services asked residents in the valley floor, including Marysville, a city of 12,000 people, to evacuate and take routes to the east, south, or west and avoid traveling north toward Oroville.

    The California Department of Water Resources said it is releasing as much as 100,000 cubic feet per second from the main, heavily damaged spillway to try to drain the lake.

    Department Kevin Dossey tells the Sacramento Bee the emergency spillway was rated to handle 250,000 cubic feet per second, but it began to show weakness Sunday at a small fraction of that. Flows through the spillway peaked at 12,600 cubic feet per second at 1 a.m. Sunday and were down to 8,000 cubic feet per second by midday.

    Water began flowing over the emergency spillway at the Oroville Dam in Northern California on Saturday for the first time in its nearly 50-year history after heavy rainfall.

    Unexpected erosion chewed through the main spillway earlier this week, sending chunks of concrete flying and creating a 200-foot-long, 30-foot-deep hole that continues growing. Engineers don't know what caused the cave-in, but Chris Orrock, a spokesman for the state Department of Water Resources, said it appears the dam's main spillway has stopped crumbling even though it's being used for water releases.

    About 150 miles northeast of San Francisco, Lake Oroville is one of California's largest man-made lakes, and the 770-foot-tall Oroville Dam is the nation's tallest. The lake is a central piece of California's government-run water delivery network, supplying water for agriculture in the Central Valley and residents and businesses in Southern California.
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    The dam peaked at 902.58 feet on 2/12/2017 @ 2AM,(maximum is 900 feet) this put it over 2.58 inches over flood stage, it has dropped to 901.02 feet tonight at 10 PM.

    Releases are still at a maximum @ 100,000 cubic feet per second, bad thing is that more rain is expected by Thursday.
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    I have still have friends living in Oroville and thank god all live above the lake. Oroville is a great small city and really don't want anything bad happen. Hell before I got sick I was going to buy a house up there.
    Last edited by bigbadbrother; 02-13-2017 at 07:47 PM.
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    Default Mandatory evacuations in place for residents near Oroville Dam

    OROVILLE, Calif. --
    Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea says the evacuation below the nation's tallest dam because of the threat of flooding from a damaged spillway will not end right away. Officials said today that they are working on a plan to allow residents to return home when it's safe.

    Nearly 200,000 people remain under evacuation orders as authorities try to fix erosion of the emergency spillway at the 770-foot-tall Oroville Dam that could unleash uncontrolled flood waters if it fails.

    About 150 miles northeast of San Francisco, Lake Oroville - one of California's largest man-made lakes - had water levels so high that an emergency spillway was used Saturday for the first time in almost 50 years.

    The evacuation was ordered Sunday afternoon after engineers spotted a hole on the concrete lip of the secondary spillway for the 770-foot-tall Oroville Dam and told authorities that it could fail within the hour.

    "I'm just shocked," said Greg Levias, who was evacuating with his wife, Kaysi, two boys and a dog.

    What they couldn't fit in their trunk they piled as high as they could in their downstairs Yuba City apartment and joined the line of traffic attempting to leave the city where they had moved just three weeks ago.

    Panicked and angry residents sat in bumper-to-bumper traffic hours after the evacuation order was given.

    Raj Gill was managing a Shell station where anxious motorists got gas and snacks while waiting for gridlocked traffic to clear. His boss told him to close the station and flee himself, but he stayed open to feed a steady line of customers.

    "You can't even move," he said. "I'm trying to get out of here too. I'm worried about the flooding. I've seen the pictures - that's a lot of water."

    A Red Cross spokeswoman said more than 500 people were at an evacuation center in Chino, California. The shelter had run out of blankets and cots, and a semi-tractor trailer with 1,000 more cots was stuck in the gridlock of traffic fleeing the potential flooding, said Red Cross shelter manager Pam Deditch.

    A California Highway Patrol spokesman said they would have two planes out Monday to help with traffic control as well as search and rescue.

    State Fire and Rescue Chief Kim Zagaris said at least 250 law enforcement officers from throughout the state are in the area or on their way to help with the evacuation.

    Late Sunday, officials said the evacuation orders remained in place despite the fact water was no longer spilling over the eroded area.

    "There is still a lot of unknowns," Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea said at a news conference. "We need to continue to lower the lake levels and we need to give the Department of Water Resources time to fully evaluate the situation so we can make the decision to whether or not it is safe to repopulate the area."

    About 188,000 residents of Yuba, Sutter and Butte counties were ordered to evacuate.

    Acting Director Department of Water Resources Bill Croyle said officials will be able to assess the damage to the emergency spillway now that the lake levels have been lowered.

    The erosion at the head of the emergency spillway threatens to undermine the concrete weir and allow large, uncontrolled releases of water from Lake Oroville. Those potential flows could overwhelm the Feather River and other downstream waterways, channels and levees and flood towns in three counties.

    Oroville Lake levels had decreased by Sunday night as they let water flow from its heavily damaged main spillway.

    Croyle said the department will continue releasing as much as 100,000 cubic feet per second from the main spillway to try and reduce the dam's level by 50 feet ahead of storms forecast to reach the area Wednesday.

    Department engineer and spokesman Kevin Dossey told the Sacramento Bee the emergency spillway was rated to handle 250,000 cubic feet per second, but it began to show weakness Sunday after flows peaked at 12,600 cubic feet per second.

    Honea said there was a plan to plug the hole by using helicopters to drop rocks into the crevasse. But Croyle said at that no repair work was done after officials looked at the flow and available resources.

    Gov. Jerry Brown late Sunday issued an emergency order to fortify authorities' response to the emergency at the dam and help with evacuations.

    Adjutant General David S. Baldwin of the California National Guard said at a news conference late Sunday that eight helicopters will be available Monday to assist with emergency spillway reconstruction.

    The California National Guard put out a notification to all 23,000 soldiers and airmen to be ready to deploy if needed, he said. Baldwin says an alert for the entire California National Guard hadn't been issued since the 1992 riots.

    Earlier Sunday, officials stressed the Oroville Dam itself was structurally sound.

    Unexpected erosion chewed through the main spillway during heavy rain earlier this week, sending chunks of concrete flying and creating a 200-foot-long, 30-foot-deep hole that continues growing. Engineers don't know what caused the cave-in, but Chris Orrock, a Department of Water Resources spokesman, said it appears the dam's main spillway has stopped crumbling even though it's being used for water releases.

    The lake is a central piece of California's government-run water delivery network, supplying water for agriculture in the Central Valley and residents and businesses in Southern California.
    When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross." -- Sinclair Lewis

    The answer is 42

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