{"id":521248,"date":"2017-10-11T04:35:49","date_gmt":"2017-10-11T04:35:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/?p=521248"},"modified":"2020-10-25T11:44:54","modified_gmt":"2020-10-25T11:44:54","slug":"dam-in-puerto-rico-bursts-in-wake-of-hurricane-maria","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/en\/infrastructure\/dam-in-puerto-rico-bursts-in-wake-of-hurricane-maria.html","title":{"rendered":"Dam in Puerto Rico bursts in wake of Hurricane Maria"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"diga-pericolosa-portorico.jpg5\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I<\/strong>n the aftermath of Hurricane Maria\u2019s sweep through the Caribbean<\/strong>, the United States was reminded of the urgent need to address the risk posed by its ageing dams <\/strong>as one of them \u2013 the Guajataca – threatened to fail in Puerto Rico<\/strong>, putting 70,000 lives at risk.
As if the damage wreaked by the hurricane on their two towns in the island\u2019s northwest was not enough, survivors emerged from the rubble of their homes <\/strong>to an urgent call to flee.
Water was overflowing the spillway of the nearby Puerto Rico Guajataca Dam <\/strong>and risked sweeping away everything in its path \u2013 including what was left of their homes in the towns of Isabela and Central Quebradillas.
Damaged by the hurricane, the Guajataca dam was under enormous strain after the subsequent heavy rainfall had swollen its reservoir.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Guajataca Dam is failing: Stay away or be swept away<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

\u00abStay away or be swept away<\/strong>\u00bb, warned the National Weather Service<\/strong> in a post on its website on September 26. \u00abThe risk of failure of the Guajataca Dam (continues), which would potentially cause life-threatening flash flooding downstream on Rio Guajataca\u00bb, it added, referring to the river of the same name as the dam.
\u00abRiver banks and culverts can become unstable and unsafe<\/strong>\u00bb, it said. \u00abStay away from evacuated areas until told by emergency officials it is safe to return\u00bb.
Speaking to U.S. television network NBC a few days earlier, Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rossello said 70,000 people in the river valley downstream from the dam could be in danger if the structure were to fail.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Television images of the waters rushing down from the dam joined those of the devastation brought about by the hurricane, which left many parts of the island without power or water.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"infografica-eng-dighe\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Puerto Rico Dam Recalls Oroville Dam<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The images, which were also posted on social media, recalled those from Oroville<\/strong> in northern California<\/strong>. The tallest dam in the United States<\/strong> saw its spillway suffer severe damage following heavy rainstorms<\/strong> in February, forcing the evacuation of more than 100,000 people who lived downstream.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both cases are similar: old dams in need of inspection and repair overwhelmed by bad weather.<\/strong>
An interim status memorandum published on September 5 by an independent forensic team inspecting Oroville identified a number of design and construction weaknesses<\/strong> that might have facilitated the damage<\/strong>, such as a \u201cdeficient\u201d drainage system<\/strong> and shallow rock anchorage.
Work is already underway to repair and reinforce the structure.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Puerto Rico Dam Reservoir Levels<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Built in 1929, the Guajataca Dam is one of 38 dams in Puerto Rico<\/strong>, according to the National Inventory of Dams managed by the Army Corps of Engineers.
It is 120 feet<\/strong> (37 metres) high and nearly 1,000 feet <\/strong>(305 metres) long, lying across the Guajataca River <\/strong>to form a reservoir for drinking, irrigation and power generation.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The reservoir\u2019s water storage capacity of 39,286 acre-feet <\/strong>(48.5 million cubic meters), but by 1999 it was reduced <\/strong>by sediment infilling to 34,276 acre-feet (42.3 million cubic meters), according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
According to the inventory of the Army Corps of Engineers, the Guajataca Dam in Puerto Rico<\/strong> was last inspected in 2013<\/strong> and rated as having a \u201chigh hazard potential<\/strong>\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the aftermath of Hurricane Maria\u2019s sweep through the Caribbean, the United States was reminded of the urgent need to address the risk posed by its ageing dams as one of them \u2013 the Guajataca – threatened to fail in Puerto Rico, putting 70,000 lives at risk.As if the damage wreaked by the hurricane on their two towns in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":169212,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[19004,19002,19013],"yst_prominent_words":[3081,117,17576,3079,3066,3085,3075,16674,5092,655],"class_list":["post-521248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-infrastructure","tag-development-and-growth","tag-new-challenges","tag-north-and-south-america"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/521248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=521248"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/521248\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":542415,"href":"https:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/521248\/revisions\/542415"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/169212"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=521248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=521248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=521248"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.webuildvalue.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=521248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}