Collapse of 20-year-old irrigation lake dike in Gia Lai

As of noon on November 14, construction units were still urgently working to fix the broken dam body of the irrigation reservoir in Chu Se district, Gia Lai province.

Mr. Phan Phuoc Thien, Deputy Director of Gia Lai Province Irrigation Works Company Limited, said that at around 3:00 a.m. the same day, a sinkhole appeared upstream of the Ia Ring irrigation reservoir in Chu Se district (Gia Lai), causing water to overflow.

Workers are urgently fixing the sinkhole that caused the irrigation lake to overflow.

Urgently fix the problem of irrigation reservoir

The incident occurred at the water inlet, the area between the dam body of the irrigation reservoir and the 11km long irrigation canal. With high pressure, the flow through the sinkhole gradually increased, creating a vortex that caused water to leak out. The water then escaped through the culvert corridor, causing 4 reinforced concrete slabs of the upstream roof to collapse about 6m2, the estimated depth of the sinkhole was about 19m.

Mr. Thien said that immediately after the incident, the company focused on temporary handling by using boulders, stone baskets, and tarpaulins to put into the sinkhole. Then, they used soil sacks to build a dike around the sinkhole area, used steel mesh, and constructed concrete with fast-setting additives to ensure water retention.

In addition, to reduce flow pressure at the incident site, the company opened the spillway at ^7m3 /s to lower the reservoir water level to minimize subsidence upstream of the dam.

Mr. Thien said that currently, the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chu Se district, and communes have mobilized forces to coordinate in handling the incident. Up to now, the water pressure has decreased and no damage to property or people has been detected.

According to the People's Committee of Chu Se district, at the time of the incident of water drainage from the irrigation system, the local authorities inspected the downstream area of ​​the irrigation system.

A leader of Chu Se district said that immediately after receiving the information, he requested the authorities of the downstream localities, namely Ia Tiem, Dun, and Kong Htok communes, to urgently monitor and respond promptly. The amount of water flowing downstream flooded some areas of unharvested rice fields. In the area near the foot of the dam, people are currently preparing for the new crop so they have only just improved the land. Currently, there are no statistics on the damage in the incident.

For the area where the culverts overflowed some local traffic routes and were flooded, the local government assigned the commune police force and militia to guard and ensure people's safety.

Reservoir water drains out.

Construction over 20 years

It is known that Ia Ring reservoir, Chu Se is a level 3 irrigation project, started construction in 2003. The reservoir has a useful capacity of 10.18 million m3 of water, designed to irrigate 2,300 hectares.

Mr. Vu Ngoc An, Deputy Director of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Gia Lai, said that the force is using stone cages to fill the damaged dam. In addition, the spillway gates are opened to lower the water level below the damaged dam body, which is expected to be 3-4m below the current elevation . After that, the cause of the dam body problem and solutions will be carefully assessed.

Mr. Nguyen Nang Dung, Director of Gia Lai Irrigation Works Exploitation Company Limited, said that the dam was built more than 20 years ago. After a long time of using it to store water, the dam body began to deteriorate.

Source: https://www.baogiaothong.vn/sut-than-de-ho-thuy-loi-hon-20-nam-tuoi-o-gia-lai-192241114142958287.htm