Lots of water

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HenryJ
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Lots of water

Post by HenryJ »

We had a bumper crop this year.
The Owyhee Dams water shed saw 150% of average snow pack. This spring we have had above average precip. Things are a month ahead of schedule around here. The Owyhee Dam is nearing full and there is still above average snow pack yet to arrive.
Normal river flow for the summer is 200 cfs. We are putting out around 11,000 cfs right now.
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Forgive the quality of the images. I forgot my camera and had to use my phone to take these pictures.

That one was from below the dam. In the next one you can see the needle valves. These help to divert the flow from the tunnel (Glory hole) and lessen the damage to the hydros access road.

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Here are a couple shots of the glory hole.

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That is a four hundred plus foot drop to the bottom of the dam.

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Only a foot or two left. People downstream are being flooded and it will get worse in the next few days. Rising temperatures are melting snowpack and once the dam is full there is no choice but to release everything that is coming in.
Here is a link to the realtime data - Owyhee Hydromet Teacup
If you click on the reporting stations you can see the realtime flows, and a water year graph like this one of our Rome inflows to the dam.

The Malheur bridge station is closest to my location. It floods pretty good at 4000 cfs.

Plenty of water here this year :)

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Post by killian96ss »

We have the same problems down here in California. Almost every reservoir in the state is spilling over and parts of the Sacramento valley are purposely being flooded to make more room for the next round of storms. It rained 26 days in March which broke the all time record for that month. So far there is no end in sight for the Pacific storms. :!: Personally I think global warming is starting to change our weather patterns. Take a look at all the tornados. 285 were reported in march which is only the first month of tornado season. :shock: The average for March is only 70, and I believe it will get much worse. :( The predictions for the 2006 Atlantic hurricane season are very bad, and it should easily be the worst of all time just like last year. To top it all off, the CA bay area has been having a lot of small earthquakes which is usually a precursor to the next big one that will likely happen before the year 2020. :(

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HenryJ
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Post by HenryJ »

While our average rainfall is less than twelve inches and we have nearly met that already, I don't think this is extremely unusual.
Humans are short sighted. Geological cycles are much broader. Last year was the eleventh year of a seven year drought cycle. We were due. It has been over ten years since that glory hole has been used and while we may indeed flow more water than has ever been let out of this Dam, The valley here needs the water. Refilling aquifers, replenishing springs, flushing river channels of silt.

The big "scare" in the seventies was the next ice age. I still have a Time Life book dedicated to the impending ice age. Now the concern is global warming. It will be interesting to see what happens in the next 30 years. Maybe that shift of the earths axis will give us a polar region on the isle of California? :lol:

"Speed doesn't kill, suddenly becoming stationary does." - Richard Hammond
"Speed is just a matter of Money - How fast do YOU want to go?"-Mechanic from Mad Max-
If at first you don't succeed - Don't take up Skydiving!
- ThunderII KE7CSK
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killian96ss
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Post by killian96ss »

HenryJ wrote:Maybe that shift of the earths axis will give us a polar region on the isle of California? :lol:
I hope not! :lol: Global warming is a fact, and not just humans being paranoid again. Take a look at the polar ice caps. Did you know that 20% of the ice has melted since the early 70's. Polar bears will be extinct by the end of this century and oceans will rise at least 20ft in the next 60-80 years. All that freshwater will disrupt global ocean currents and cause major weather pattern changes. The earth is also in the early stages of magnetic pole reversal. When the poles do decide to switch there will be a few days to a month where we won't be shielded from the sun's radiation. In other words things will melt very rapidly and you could get a good sunburn in only a few minutes. :shock: The rainfall here in CA is anything but normal, however I agree water is always needed, just not this much! :roll: I can think of other parts of the country that need it a whole lot more than we do. :( BTW, those are some cool pictures of the "glory hole" spillway. We have a spillway exactly like that at Lake Berryessa. I remember when I was younger a group of kids decided to take their raft over to the hole to check it out and one of the girls decided to sit on the rim and somehow fell backwards. She did not survive the fall. :( The sound that hole makes when the water is flowing down is similar to thunder. We have another spillway nearby that channels water downhill and then it shoots it straight up to avoid damaging a nearby road. When this thing gets flowing it shoots water upwards into a 100ft high inverted waterfall. Me and my son made the front page of the LA Times a couple of years ago posed in front of this waterfall. 8)

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Post by border man »

Send some of that rain over to Arizona please!! After a record rainfall last winter, this year has been extremely dry. I think we went like 147 days without rain this year up till sometime in march.
[size=75]I didn't do it, it was already like that when I got it.[/size]
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HenryJ
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Post by HenryJ »

Here are a couple more from today-

ImageImage

"Speed doesn't kill, suddenly becoming stationary does." - Richard Hammond
"Speed is just a matter of Money - How fast do YOU want to go?"-Mechanic from Mad Max-
If at first you don't succeed - Don't take up Skydiving!
- ThunderII KE7CSK
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HenryJ
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Re: Lots of water

Post by HenryJ »

Here we go again.

Owyhee Tea cup
Rome is rock'n a steady 10.000 CFS and we are putting through almost everything that comes in. Owyhee river below the dam

All three jet flow valves are at 100% and the ring gate is operating.

Image

"Speed doesn't kill, suddenly becoming stationary does." - Richard Hammond
"Speed is just a matter of Money - How fast do YOU want to go?"-Mechanic from Mad Max-
If at first you don't succeed - Don't take up Skydiving!
- ThunderII KE7CSK