Effects of Cumberland Dam Flooding

[rossc]

Originally Posted by collgra

Lake Cumberland, Wolf Creek Dam has been under constant construction for leaks around the base of the dam off and on since the late 1960's. It is a really lucky thing for Nashville that congress saw fit to allocate a large portion of of repair money in 2008. According to the Army Corps Lake Cumberland is the largest lake East of the Mississippi. In fact it is so large that every man made lake could fit inside and have room left over for some more. If that dam should fail suddenly all debts are off for Nashville. The water would top every dam downstream and it would be a good guess that all the dams downstream would be at least topped if not broken. Do a search on Wolfcreek Dam. It is unlikely that even the corps doesn't know for certain how much damage would be done.

There is a documentary on this dam. I think it was called "The crumbling of America" on the history channel. It is about the crumbling infrastructure across the country. They said if the Wolf Creek Dam broke it would basically wipe out Nashville. They said the stadium would be completely under water.

[collgra]

Really Creeksitter,
From the Army Corps of Engineers:

"Wolf Creek Dam, near Jamestown, Kentucky, impounds Lake Cumberland, which is the largest reservoir east of the Mississippi River and ninth largest in the U.S. At over a mile long, the 5,736 feet dam provides a total flood storage capacity of 6,089,000 acre-feet (1 acre-foot = 1 acre, 1 foot deep or 325,850 gallons). One could add all the water of all the other lakes in the Ohio River Valley System and still have room for more water."


Do you really think that the catastrophic failure of Wolf Creek would be of little consequence?



According to an article by WTVF Nashville news station: "In an exclusive report, NewsChannel 5 reporter Nick Beres looked at how engineers plan to do it.

If Wolf Creek dam breaks, how bad would it get in Nashville?

Forget Tennessee Titans football. LP Field would be better suited for water polo.
"The 30-yard line would be 30 feet underwater. Everything above Nashville, the effects would be a little more pronounced. Everything below Nashville, a little less," said Lt. Col. Steve Roemhildt of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Roemhildt is in charge of making sure that doesn't happen.
"This would be significant," he said.

If the dam fails, parts of Middle Tennessee from Nashville to Mount Juliet to Carthage will flood."


To put this in perspective the recent flooding in Nashville put about 6" in the Titans Stadium. Army Corp estimates 30' if the dam broke at Wolf Creek. I'd call that a major flood.


Inside Wolf Creek Dam: Part 2 - NewsChannel5.com | Nashville News, Weather & Sports


Wolf Creek Dam (http://gisweb.apsu.edu/WolfCreek.html - broken link)

[barrylincoln]

Originally Posted by collgra

Lake Cumberland, Wolf Creek Dam has been under constant construction for leaks around the base of the dam off and on since the late 1960's. It is a really lucky thing for Nashville that congress saw fit to allocate a large portion of of repair money in 2008. According to the Army Corps Lake Cumberland is the largest lake East of the Mississippi. In fact it is so large that every man made lake could fit inside and have room left over for some more. If that dam should fail suddenly all debts are off for Nashville. The water would top every dam downstream and it would be a good guess that all the dams downstream would be at least topped if not broken. Do a search on Wolfcreek Dam. It is unlikely that even the corps doesn't know for certain how much damage would be done.

Living in Michigan, I had to sign up for this Forum just to laugh at the part about Lake Cumberland being the biggest lake E of the Mississippi. My brother lives at Dale Hollow, been there many time. I have a map too. You need to look at one.

[collgra]

Sorry, that was a misquote it should have been every lake in the Ohio river system would fit behind wolf creek with room left over. I don't know about you but I don't want to be downstream of that should it break.

From the Army Corps of Engineers:

"Wolf Creek Dam, near Jamestown, Kentucky, impounds Lake Cumberland, which is the largest reservoir east of the Mississippi River and ninth largest in the U.S. At over a mile long, the 5,736 feet dam provides a total flood storage capacity of 6,089,000 acre-feet (1 acre-foot = 1 acre, 1 foot deep or 325,850 gallons). One could add all the water of all the other lakes in the Ohio River Valley System and still have room for more water."

Wolf Creek Dam (http://gisweb.apsu.edu/WolfCreek.html - broken link)

[barrylincoln]

All the rain from this Spring was a pretty good test for the repairs the Army Corps of Engineers made. I heard they had to let some water out this year. Since I'm in Michigan, I don't know that for a fact. My brother said the Lake was higher than he ever saw it a month or so ago. You are 100% correct about not wanting to live downstream of that Dam if it failed. I see people here saying that it would only impact Nashville 1/4 mile from the River. I wonder if that's true. I think it would be much worse than that, but it's just an opinion. It would also devastate tourism for small towns like Albany that depend on the lake, as well as big problems for people with million dollar houseboats on the Lake that would be sitting in mud.

As big as the Great Lakes are it's hard to compare but, Lake Cumberland has a tremendous amount of shoreline. If all that water was sent to Nashville, I believe it would be a lot worse than people think. That's and awfully big dam.

I also wonder what's under that lake. A lot of history has a bunch of water covering it. There was Civil War battles fought there, homes, forgotten towns and Indian Villages, etc. It is truly beautiful.

BTW, what you said about Lake cumberland being the biggest E. of the Mississippi may come true some day. Arizona and other dry states have been eyeballing the Great Lakes, wanting to pipe some their way. What people dont think about is that we are selling the Great Lakes a bottle of water at a time and sending it all over the World. There is a fat guy sitting naked in a bath tub in Milwaulkee, filling up water bottles for sale, laughing his arse off.