Still Smarter

My heart goes out to the residents threatened by this.

The man on the news was reporting on the success of the high volume pumps.... Made me think had anyone thought about a huge syphon?

What Mash, do you want me to imagine this dam is
full of Gin?? Where is my Tonic On my way

Joking aside it is very sad and once again nature reminds
Man, we are not really in charge, Nature is

Hindsight is a wonderful thing.
I looked at the helo footage of a dirty great reservoir, up the hill, and a village being built and lived in, below it.
I am old enough to remember the Aberfan disaster.
Would I live in a valley, without looking up the hill?

Robert.

Re: The syphon idea.
They only have to get the water started, discconect the pump from the pipe and then move on.
They don't need more pumps, just more pipes.

I concur with ED. I have empathy and without knowing prices or clauses, in their situation would be in my solicitors in the morning.

That's it Ed... You can run a huge amount of syphons, for just the cost of the hose.

Would I live in a valley... Don't think so.

Would I evacuate?

Erm, in this instance, speed is of the essence (they'd need to have all the test data to know of the water percentage of the damaged section to be able to project "when" it might fail).

So, with siphons, well I'd guess that might work if there's time for it to be sorted out. Just that with pumping, the amount of water pushed along the pipes is considerably quicker (ambient pressure flow from siphon Vs pressurised flow through the same diameter pipe - the latter is quicker).

Having been involved on a job where the stability of a reservoir was under threat (in my case, it was a broken 4ft sewer main that was causing the potential issue), there's a number of ways that this can be prevented, quality of the build but equally the design of the "system" are both relevant in the first place.

If it was "just" a case of getting rid of excess water, then a siphon system should be fine - in this case, it's not. Impractical.

All it really does, is call into question the aforementioned designs and quality of build, but also location of water body i.e. reservoirs built by daming waterways etc, but also ones that may have issues like habitation in the path of possible disaster flow would obviously be the ones that are checked first etc......

Either way, all power to those affected in that location for taking the possibility of the threat seriously. If it did fail completely, they'd not have much time to react.........

I think the emergency services and all concerned have done a brilliant job. However some of the residents, when interviewed did seem a tad shortsighted.

Pinky in life most people selfish and only think of their
own needs, when it all goes Pete Tong, the (heroes)
emergency services are left to pick up the pieces.

Sorry to sound "Right Wing", but Joe public are so fecking stoopid.
I used to help campaign for a political party.
Knocked a lot of doors and delivererd a lot of leaflets.
Met a lot of of people.
That didn't bother to vote, and then complained at any result.
You really do get the government that you deserve.
And if you don't bother, then you have no right to bitch.

Off my soapbox,
Robert.

I'm not sure that in the UK anyone outside NI has the government that the majority voted for or deserve and we have none.

We certainly do not have a Prime Minister voted for by anything like a majority of the population.
The political system needs some serious work.
Can we fix it?
Sorry Bob the Builder, this is outwith your remit.

Robert.