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It’s kind of a new problem for us.”Īpart from earthquake issues are ones associated with flooding.Ī key concept is the “probable maximum flood,” McNinch said, explaining that the probable maximum flood for this area is 19 inches of rain in a 24-hour period, which would be rare. “When we build out there, if the ground is becoming more unstable, we have to build in a different way like California so we don’t have cracking. “Our dam wasn’t built for earthquakes,” Blair said in 2017.
#MEANDER RESERVOIR CRACK#
There was no significant findings that there is a serious crack or issue with the dam,” Holloway said.īlair and the rest of the MVSD board were in the planning stages for the dam renovation in 2017. “Most of cracks here on the buildings is over time, age and some settlement of the buildings. Water Management Services injection well on state Route 169 in Weathersfield. But he clarified that he was also referring to the two lesser earthquakes that occurred near an American 31, 2011, earthquake caused by a D&L Energy injection well on Ohio Works Drive in Youngstown. Holloway was referring to the magnitude-4.0 Dec. We looked close at the dam and the buildings … but there was no significant damage from the one seismic activity we had here,” Holloway said. There are age cracks and things of that nature and the same thing with buildings. However, Tom Holloway, operator of record at the Meander Water Treatment Plant and former MVSD chief engineer, said last week the Gannett Fleming study indicated that seismic activity had not caused any significant damage to the MVSD facilities, including the dam. The Meander Reservoir dam is 50 feet high and 3,550 feet long with a 260-foot primary spillway located just southwest of the state Route 46 and Salt Springs Road intersection in Mineral Ridge.įormer MVSD president Matt Blair expressed concerns over the safety of the dam in 2017, wondering whether injection-well-induced seismic activity in Youngstown and Weathersfield were contributing to cracks in MVSD buildings and the dam. The filing quotes Weathersfield fire Chief Tom Lambert as saying such a flood would “totally flood out the south side of Niles, downtown Niles and keep heading toward the city of Warren.” Lambert said, “There would be a lot of lives involved.” It says that a “a major earthquake could have catastrophic consequences” because it is “upstream from homes, businesses and industrial sites that would be catastrophically flooded in the event of its breach.” The filing adds that a study carried out by the engineering firm Gannett Fleming noted that the dam was “not designed using modern standards to withstand earthquakes.” Furthermore, “detailed engineering studies by Gannett Fleming indicated that the dam’s existing upstream slope does not meet current safety criteria for the maximum credible earthquake loadings.”
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He said the reason is that it “could have a seismic effect on the dam.”Īmerican Water Management and ODNR are debating what type of rules the American Water Management well should follow to prevent the injection well from causing earthquakes that could damage the community, including the Meander Reservoir dam.Ī recent ODNR filing in a case before the Ohio Oil and Gas Commission states the Meander dam is “just three miles away” from the Weathersfield well, and the dam is a “special risk,” as it “serves as the sole drinking water source for over 220,000 people and holds approximately 11 billion gallons of water.”
![meander reservoir meander reservoir](https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50239217262_571996c8f1_b.jpg)
He and other MVSD officials have been following the legal and administrative activities associated with the American Water Management injection well in Weathersfield, which is regulated by ODNR, McNinch said.