California's Lake Oroville Main Spillway Severely Damaged/Eroded. Oroville Dam's Recently Reconstructed Main Spillway Fundamentally Flawed

Inflow is only going to be occurring from the 1,000 feet area above lake level. Above that will freeze at night. Inflows should peak early afternoon as the overnight ice melts.

I know that, but thanks for confirming it for me. The road is usually lit up all the way along, but earlier the lights were all out and the floodlights at the end were off too. Like somebody else said, maybe there was a power cut due to the weather.

lights are on here

[link to www.parks.ca.gov (secure)]

5.22" expected in the next 24-26 hours. The real test is incoming, BUT, now that we all know the lip of the remaining spillway is sitting on good hard stuff, and they can even raise the outflows back to 100,000 cfs, they have a BETTER chance of handling the inflows now.

Let's just hope they survive this and CA goes dry again until the thaws start in earnest.

Say they get 6" of rain...that would be, theoretically, 864" (or 72 feet) of inflows, but, at 100,000 cfs they can outflow just 6.2 inches during that time. So, on paper, 71.5" of inflows WILL overflow a reservoir that is now down 51.5' from the top of the ES.

Again, they must have other diversions going on, and/or unreported seepage keeping the lake dropping despite what the numbers say should be happening.

I REALLY COULD CARE LESS WHAT UNREPORTED STUFF THEY MAY/ARE DOING TO SAVE THE ES (AND THE SAN JOAQUIN VALLEY.)

More people care then not....

Did the American People ask to be lied too?

They should be releasing EVERYTHING they know and are doing to save the dam.


Anyone who purposefully deceives people regarding the Oroville crisis will face divine judgement.

Damn those who lie to the American People!!!

They are now, but they weren't earlier when the post was made.

President Trump will mop the floor with all of them
once the DOJ investigation is complete.

There is a god after all

Geesh...I should not try doing math before lots of coffee and waking up!

Here's the correct calculation for outflows at 100,000 cfs over 24 hours...

(If they can use the MS that hard...)

The total outflows at 100,000 CFS for 24 hours can be calculated using 100,000 x 3600 x 24. (3600 converts seconds to hours, and then you have 24 hours..) That number is 8,640,000,000.

The square footage of the reservoir surface is the other factor we need, and that is calculated by converting the known 25 square mile surface area to square feet. We do that by taking 25 x 640 (acres) x 43560 (square feet per acre). That number is 696,960,000.

Water level drop is simply dividing the total output by the square footage of the reservoir...8640000000/696960000...or 12.4 feet. So even at 6" of rainfall, if they crank the MS open to 100,000 cfs, we're safe! 7" or more...we're screwed.

5.22" expected in the next 24-26 hours. The real test is incoming, BUT, now that we all know the lip of the remaining spillway is sitting on good hard stuff, and they can even raise the outflows back to 100,000 cfs, they have a BETTER chance of handling the inflows now.

Let's just hope they survive this and CA goes dry again until the thaws start in earnest.

Say they get 6" of rain...that would be, theoretically, 864" (or 72 feet) of inflows, but, at 100,000 cfs they can outflow just 6.2 inches during that time. So, on paper, 71.5" of inflows WILL overflow a reservoir that is now down 51.5' from the top of the ES.

Again, they must have other diversions going on, and/or unreported seepage keeping the lake dropping despite what the numbers say should be happening.

I REALLY COULD CARE LESS WHAT UNREPORTED STUFF THEY MAY/ARE DOING TO SAVE THE ES (AND THE SAN JOAQUIN VALLEY.)

I know that, but thanks for confirming it for me. The road is usually lit up all the way along, but earlier the lights were all out and the floodlights at the end were off too. Like somebody else said, maybe there was a power cut due to the weather.

Really? I guess they were showing their extreme confidence in that "good hard stuff" by rushing to get the high tension lines down as darkness approached from the towers right by that "good hard stuff."

To summarize all my recent blatherings: We are probably OK if 5" (or less) of rain falls in the catchment area and all 5" (or less) comes to the dam over the next 24 hours. 5.5-6" is iffy...over 6" is getting really dicey...7"+ and we're toast.

UNKNOWN VARIABLES:

1. Upstream diversions we are not being told about
2. Unmeasured and unreported dam seepages we are not being told about.
3. Snow pack and snow pack melt in the catchment area.

Geesh...I should not try doing math before lots of coffee and waking up!

Here's the correct calculation for outflows at 100,000 cfs over 24 hours...

(If they can use the MS that hard...)

The total outflows at 100,000 CFS for 24 hours can be calculated using 100,000 x 3600 x 24. (3600 converts seconds to hours, and then you have 24 hours..) That number is 8,640,000,000.

The square footage of the reservoir surface is the other factor we need, and that is calculated by converting the known 25 square mile surface area to square feet. We do that by taking 25 x 640 (acres) x 43560 (square feet per acre). That number is 696,960,000.

Water level drop is simply dividing the total output by the square footage of the reservoir...8640000000/696960000...or 12.4 feet. So even at 6" of rainfall, if they crank the MS open to 100,000 cfs, we're safe! 7" or more...we're screwed.

thank you

You're welcome. Sorry for all the recalculating this morning. I am being "terribly" distracted by my first grandchild this morning, who I've only seen a few times before during her short and precious 6 months of life.

Here's a pretty good article from yesterday on "The Worst Case Scenario" for Oroville dam...pretty optimistic and straight forward...good explanation for new people who haven't been following as closely.


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NWS urging people to be prepared to evacuate with less than 15 mins notice, possibility of flooding in areas unseen in “many years”

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Good Morning everyone. Usually, I only have 10 pages to catch up on. Today it's 20. I'm deep into the middle of the tard-party at this point.

I'm a Catch-Up Tard.



Hoping for the best today, but expecting the worst.

Thank you to all who have contributed so much to this thread. I have learned so much!

they're firing workers and the Dam is collapsing.

yeh, real bright.

puff piece.

yes I am...

OROVILLE DAM: Drone footage provided by the California Department Of Water Resources


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