The 'damned' Colorado River

This afternoon my son and I ventured out to the Hoover Dam. Again the scenery en route was that of numerous arid hills but when we stopped at a Viewpoint, just before reaching the dam, the sight before us was amazing. We could see a large amount of water, which in fact represented perhaps just a quarter of the 100 mile long stretch of water which makes up Lake Mead, with the high water mark made in 1983 clearly visible way above the exisitng water level.

A new bridge was built a couple of years ago to take the traffic away from travelling over the Dam as previously and it is a remakable feat of engineering in itself and complements the architecture of the dam. Once parked at the Dam we had a good view of the bridge, although almost every view is spoilt for photographers as there are so many cables or electrical pylons in the way! The Dam itself is immense and no photo can really justify its majesty...so I chose to blip this view taken after sunset as it shows the dam floodlit with no other distractions to the eye.

We took a tour of the Power Room deep in the gunwhales of the dam and learnt about the decision making surrounding the need to somehow harness and control the huge Colorado River which had caused so much disruption to life all along its 1,450 mile long course due to its fluctuations in levels, especially when it was in spate in spring after the icemelt. Once the decision had been made to dam the river at Black Rock Canyon, four huge tunnels were made over two years in order to divert the river and leave a mile long stretch of dry area for the dam to be built. These tunnels were subsequently used to provide overspill facilities when the water levels became too high. The water is also managed within the dam to run through enormous turbines to generate electricity and the sale of this has completely covered the cost of the dam construction and now pays for its annual running costs. It ws stressed that the Dam is principally for the control of water throughout the length of the river and the provision of electricity is purely a by-product - if the water levels are too low then some of the generators are simply turned off to reduce the flow of water out of the Lake. The Dam itself is enormous, at 750' high, and while it took five years to build it was finished two years ahead of schedule and under budget. It is an astonishing feat of civil engineering and is quite breathtaking. When the guide knew we were from Scotland he told us that the architect of the exterior was Gordon Kauffman from Britain.

There is no doubt that LasVegas, spawned in the middle of the desert, could not exist without the Hoover Dam.