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Whaley Bridge Evacuated


furnessvale

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10 minutes ago, furnessvale said:

Things looking a bit more serious.  Low lying residents in Furness Vale now evacuated.  Mountain rescue teams on standby in the village.

 

George

This sounds very similar to what we had near us.  We live 100 metres away from Ulley Reservoir, luckily we are above the site.   In 2007 following big rains the spillways failed and a rotational fault threatened the dam-wall.  It was all over the tv and news, M1 closed, big pumps imported from around England and Wales and the water dumped into the Don system i.e Ulley Brook, River rother and River Don, the wall was saved.  The village of Catcliffe was badly flooded.  Low lying properties as far as Conisbrough were warned and sandbagged.  This was the storm that swept down the Don flooding parts Sheffield, Meadowhall Centre, Rotherham and played havoc with boats on the SSYN at Ickles Jordan etc.

 

So the emergency services have a previous model to work from.

 

Good luck everybody

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2 hours ago, AndrewIC said:

The Americans measure reservoir capacity in acre feet!

With additional 'joy' of then calculating in US gallons, not Imperial gallons. The mental arithmetic becomes a bit overwhelming don't you think. Assuming we are talking about one foot deep over an acre then the cubic footage becomes 43,560 cu.ft. With 7.48052 US gallons to a cubic foot. The pumps, in round terms, are pumping at about 18,500 US Gallons per hour so how long will they have to pump to reduce the level by a yard? Even if you round everything off 43,500 cu.ft., 7.5 gallons to a cubic foot and 18,000 gallons per hour I'd still need a calculator, unlike the previous exercise which was simple mental arithmetic. 

 

Remind me why we went metric?:unsure: 

16 minutes ago, David Mack said:

But that doesn't allow for water flowing in.

That question wasn't asked, neither do we know if it's stopped raining.:rolleyes:

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3 hours ago, canals are us? said:

I'm surprised by how thin the concrete is. Also cant see any rebar reinforcing the dam slabs and side wall. Seems the bank is what holds the water back with little in the way of concrete. I suspect the right wall separated from the dam concrete as no reinforcing and water got underneath through the crack. Hope they get it drained in time and everyone is safe.

My understanding from tonight’s news is that the spillway is just constructed of those slabs that you can see - it’s only ever supposed to have a trickle flowing down it and those slabs protect the underlying soil.

 

Yesterday the water was flowing down the spillway in a real torrent and the force of the water was such that it somehow lifted one of those slabs. Once that happened the water could flow straight behind the remaining slabs, moving more of them but, more dangerously, eroding the bank behind them.

 

Hundreds of sandbags have been placed around that edge of the reservoir bank in an attempt to stop any more flow down the spillway. 

 

So there is and has been no ‘leak’; engineers are simply concerned as to how much that soil erosion has weakened the reservoir walls at that point. 

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24 minutes ago, matty40s said:

It hasnt, several very monsoon like showers over the afternoon/evening.

 

2 minutes ago, Rickent said:

Of which can drop a considerable amount in a short space of time.

Have you noticed how many of these 'monsoon' showers we now seem to be getting these days? I can remember when it just used to drizzle and rain, not now like having a hosepipe trained on you for 20 minutes. I have what I consider decent wet weather gear but a recent trip along the Weaver in those sort of conditions and even those waterproofs failed to keep me dry, I would go as far as to say that no-waterproofs would have kept someone dry in those conditions, even ocean sailing kit. It used to be said there is no such thing as inclement weather, merely inappropriate clothing, but being out in those conditions I'd tend to disagree.

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4 minutes ago, matty40s said:

anybody spot something in the right hand picture that could have weakened the dam??

0_DAM.jpg

That right hand picture shows how severe the flow was, especially on camera left, which picked up one of those slabs. 

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8 minutes ago, Victor Vectis said:

Richard Parry has just had a bit of a kicking on Newsnight.

 

Can't help thinking that this is not going to end well for CaRT.

 

?

Was he misquoted by the presenter - surely they need more money for maintenance? Why would he say otherwise? 

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3 minutes ago, Jennifer McM said:

Are you talking about the vegetation growing between the concrete slabs? 

From thenBBC report

'Duncan Fife lives on top of the reservoir in the old Reservoir Keeper's house, said: "We have been telling them for years that the spillway has been clogging up with plants trees and weeds. Just now they are starting to clear it. Why don't they maintain it?"'

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3 hours ago, frangar said:

More to the point the Swizzells factory might get flooded....

 

On a serious note I do hope it all turns out well.....we love the area too 

Nah, it's on the canal not the Goyt. OTOH, it could be a national crisis like when Carlisle was flooded . . . 

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1 hour ago, Grebe said:

This sounds very similar to what we had near us.  We live 100 metres away from Ulley Reservoir, luckily we are above the site.   In 2007 following big rains the spillways failed and a rotational fault threatened the dam-wall.  It was all over the tv and news, M1 closed, big pumps imported from around England and Wales and the water dumped into the Don system i.e Ulley Brook, River rother and River Don, the wall was saved.  The village of Catcliffe was badly flooded.  Low lying properties as far as Conisbrough were warned and sandbagged.  This was the storm that swept down the Don flooding parts Sheffield, Meadowhall Centre, Rotherham and played havoc with boats on the SSYN at Ickles Jordan etc.

 

So the emergency services have a previous model to work from.

 

Good luck everybody

Yes remember it well, of course on Wentworth an old feeder dam for the Fitzwilliam canal did fail and flooded my business!! Bloody dams clearly these inspections might not be a s good as they should be? Anyway fingers crossed for the residents of Whaley bridge that they dont suffer flooding like we all did down the Don

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10 minutes ago, BilgePump said:

From thenBBC report

'Duncan Fife lives on top of the reservoir in the old Reservoir Keeper's house, said: "We have been telling them for years that the spillway has been clogging up with plants trees and weeds. Just now they are starting to clear it. Why don't they maintain it?"'

Looks like heads will be rolling... ?

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