The normal day’s view of the lake shore looks like this. With the water level being so great that the water line is now at the very back of this photo along that tree line.
My wife and I drive here to see the lake shore birds. That can’t happen anymore as the waterline is now at the top of the straight part of the post. The V shape is the mark its level.
That means that the water has filled in and is along the top of the verticals of the supports. The dam is designed so that the water won’t overtake the bridge as the overflow spillway will start working at the other end of the lake. The bridge’s height is set to be always safe from water. A heck of a lot of water will be going out the emergency spillway if it gets up to that level.
This is the other end of the lake. You can see the dam with the vent structure that lets out the water sending it into the flooded Des Moines River. This is a borrowed shot as I couldn’t find credits for it. It was a news web site that used a drone camera to get it. At the middle right of this photo you can see how close it is for the emergency spillway for it to start working. At one point, is was said that the water level was just 21 inches from overflowing. Rain in northern Iowa may make it spill over by tomorrow. Our ten inch rainfall on Saturday didn’t go into this lake but it dd go into the Des Moines River below this dam. The normally low level creeks overflowed south of us and any low areas in Ankeny, or town, had their basements filled to the brim. Our house is located about three miles directly east of the edge of the lake shown. We are higher on a hill than the lake level.
In 1993 the overflow and the spillway both dumping at the same time put the Des Moines water plant underwater and there was not water being pumped for Des Moines for 19 days. They did rebuild the dikes around the water plant so that will be safe this year.
A clue to our busy day was a purchase and instillation of a new water heater.
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