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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- Eighteen years after the last dam failure in Utah, many of the state's dams still fall short of minimum safety standards.
State Dam Safety Engineer David Marble says 191 dams across the state have received a full compliance review ordered by reforms passed in 1990. Of those, 51 meet the minimum safety standards. Another 31 have lowered safety risks by altering storage levels or spill flows rather than undergoing expensive reconstruction.
Marble says the remaining 109 high-hazard dams are either prioritized for review or under investigation. But none are at imminent risk of failing.
"Whether a dam is safe or not is a tough question," Marble said from his office at the state Division of Water Rights. "When we refer to minimum safety standards, this is not a low-safety standard," he said. "This is the state-of-the-industry practice to protect public safety."
Utah has 900 dams, with more than 850 large enough to be listed on the federal National Inventory of Dams. About 50 Utah dams are federally run, including Flaming Gorge and Jordanelle. The remainder are state regulated and primarily owned by private entities like water districts or irrigation companies.
Because even a small dam can store millions of gallons of water, all are considered inherently dangerous.
The last full-blown dam failure in Utah was on New Year's Day 1989 when the Quail Creek Dam collapsed. The failure sent a 12-foot wall of water into St. George and caused some $11 million in damages to homes, roads, farms and utilities.
The catastrophe spurred state lawmakers to beef up dam-safety laws with updated design standards, enhanced inspector training and stricter quake-resistant regulations.
A nationwide survey of dam-safety incidents by the National Performance of Dams Program at Stanford University reported more than 1,090 dam-safety incidents between 1999 and 2004, including 125 failures.
Marble said Utah had a handful of safety incidents over that time period and no failures.
State engineers focus the most intense inspection efforts on about 190 high-hazard dam, a designation based on the potential loss of life and economic damage that might be seen if a failure occurred.
Most dams under federal control are considered high-hazard and under go yearly inspections and a comprehensive examination every three years.
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Information from: The Salt Lake Tribune
(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
