Just finished reading an article in the ST. LOUIS (MO) POST-DISPATCH online written by a Bernard Shanks regarding the 2011 Missouri River flood and how the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) is not completely honest about a worse-case scenario.
Bear in mind- the USACE DID prepare the reservoirs for an above-average snowfall in the Missouri's source regions.
What the Corps COULDN'T have prepared for are torrential- record-amount rainfalls that fell over Montana in May- THAT'S the issue with the high water releases.
Mr. Shanks contention is that the Fort Peck dam is "built with a flawed design" inherent in the types of dams such as Fort Peck's.
Those types of dams are known as "hydraulic-fill" dams- or built with several types of compacted Earth.
The author contends- correctly- that those types of dams are subject to liquefaction of the soils within the dam's structure- and that happens mainly with earthquakes.
Eastern Montana is not in a known earthquake zone however.
It's doubtful too that even a full reservoir over time would contribute to a dam failure of that sort.
The Longview and Blue Springs Lakes dams are also hydraulic-fill dams.
I'm sure Bernard Shanks is a quite-educated man- I'm only a layman hydrologist and meteorologist- but with 50 years of book and practical experience.
And UNTIL a hole appears in one of the upstream USACE Pick-Sloan dams- I'm not going to needlessly frighten the American people downstream.
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