Severe Cracks in China’s Zipingpu Dam
Severe cracks were discovered in the Zipingpu Dam, located in China’s Sichuan province. The cracks were discovered after Monday’s earthquake. According to Chinese authorities, the “plant and associated buildings have collapsed and some are partly sunk.” The dam is locaed upriver from Duijiangyan City, which has a population of 630,000 people.
About 2,000 troops were sent to work on a dam near the epicenter of Monday’s earthquake, state-run media reported.
The Zipingpu dam, upriver from Dujiangyan in Sichuan province, was in “great danger,” the Xinhua news agency reported.
China.org said that the 7.9-magnitude earthquake had caused “severe cracks” in the dam.
The “plant and associated buildings have collapsed and some are partly sunk,” it said of the hydropower station.
The Ministry of Water Resources said that an irrigation system and Dujiangyan City — which has a population of about 630,000 — “would be swamped,” if major problems emerged at the dam, China.org said.
More information also available at Sky News.
Update: The dam is now reported to be stable and safe.
Update 2: Updated to a correct photo of the Zipingpu Dam, as the International Rivers website had an incorrect photo.
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Dave, don’t you work down river from a century old dam along an active fault margin? Makes you wonder . . .
So true! It’s not something I normally think about. Out of sight, out of mind I guess.
Even more interesting is that it’s technically the “type locality” for the San Andreas fault…
Thing is this dam should probably never been built along a fault line. The weight of the water may have triggered the quake quite possibly. This things was only completed in 2006.