Re: Just in case you had a hydrologically uninteresting day...

George wrote:

"Jo Schaper" <joschapern4ospam@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message news:11q1mqrne319994@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/missouristatenews/story/0A4A827BA5C98DB2862570D7004F9A49?OpenDocument


Nope, I didn't miss it. I thought I would wait for you to post first. Thanks for the link, Jo. I had wondered all day what could have caused the reservoir to fail, and your link provided at least a preliminary assessment, which is more than I've seen elsewhere. If it holds that this was what cased the failure, I suspect there will be lawsuits.

George


All hell was breaking loose around here today because my husband works for the state parks, and we have at least a passing acquaintance with the superintendent (not a good buddy, but a recognizable face). One of the employees occasionally 'canoes to work' across the Black River as it saves a long drive around...we were quite worried on her account, too, but her house is high enough and enough from the river she wasn't in danger.

I first went to the powerplant when I was 7, and have been back a number of times since until 9/11, when they ceased having tours. Have lots of rhyolite off that mountain, and saw the leak they referred to on several occasions. I wonder (speculation only) if they hadn't had other problems in the past, but the leak served as an unintended pressure valve. Now that the upper reservoir was nice and tight, instead of gushing from the leak, the water blew out the side. I guess we wait for the engineers on that answer.

Damn. A billion gallons of water down a 700 foot drop in 12 minutes. Boggles the mind. On a typical July Saturday, at the Shut-Ins, the 52 campsites are full, plus the day use area-- somewhere around 200-400 people, and most of them are in or near the river. It could have been really, really baaad...it's a mess now, but it could have been a disaster.

The ironic thing is: over the years, everyone has worried themselves silly about the dam on the lower reservoir, which apparently weathered today OK. A couple of years ago, AmerenUE considered this facility near the end of its useful life due to silting in the lower reservoir, and attempted to obtain permits for a similar but larger and higher structure at nearby Church Mountain. For a number of reasons, it never got beyond the application stage, so they decided to try to fix Proffit Mountain. (Although named Taum Sauk, it really isn't on Taum Sauk Mountain, the highest point in the state.)

To their credit, AmerenUE has been very proactive--at a news conference today they came with phone numbers for those affected to contact them...and so forth. The damage to the state park hasn't really been assessed yet, and no doubt whatever happens, they are likely going to get a hefty bill for the damage to park. Of course, that means all us customers get to foot the recovery. Johnson's Shut-Ins is one of the most popular parks in the system, so it will be put back in business. The question floating around here is: will the power plant?

It is going to be interesting to watch where AmerenUE goes from here. Although a net wash in terms of energy production, having Taum Sauk online meant it could shift electric around, and compensate for high daytime use vs low night draws, thereby minimizing brownouts.

Having that reservoir blow out was about the last thing in the world on anyone's mind this morning.


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