Houston Update: Addicks Dam Breached, Could Be Worse Than Katrina

Addicks Dam is essentially a levy, and on the other side is a densly populated area. Here is a picture of the Addicks area, notice the dam around the area that in now full of water.

It’s interesting to note, that only a year ago, the Army Corp of Engineers published this.

As part of the Corps’ transition to looking at dam safety risk differently, Addicks and Barker dams have undergone a recent evaluation, along with all dams nationwide.

Two structural areas of concern were identified in our evaluation of these two dams. They are:

• the structures (or gates) in the dams that allow outflow to Buffalo Bayou, and
• the ends of the dams

When we combined the risks associated with these two concerns with the potential consequences to the Houston metropolitan area should there be a failure, Addicks and Barker were designated as “extremely high risk”.

http://www.swg.usace.army.mil/Missions/Dam-Safety-Program/

Fox News reported that the water is now spilling over the dam.

This is from the opposite side, see how far backed up the water is.

For a contrast, the same guy drove down into the Addicks Lake area 3 days ago, and it’s basically empty.

If you see how far he drives from where the highway goes past the dam, this is a huge body of water forming out of nowhere. Never in history has this dam been breached.

I was watching a very good video this morning that may explain how this Hurricane exploded suddenly and then parked over Houston.