The Nova Kakhovka Dam in Kherson Oblast (Formerly Ukraine, now Russia) was blown up early Tuesday morning, sending massive flood waters south, mostly into Russian-held territory. An article last year on the consequences of blowing this dam outlined the stakes . . .
As of 11:46 PM eastern US Time Monday night, it is not yet clear WHO blew the dam or why. This is a developing story . . . check back.
UPDATE 11:50 PM EDT --
To put this in perspective, the water behind the dam is the size of Rhode island.
The dam is destroyed; there’s no partial destruction of dams. The water pressure will now demolish the rest of the dam.
The flood is intensifying. This water flow has the potential energy of hundreds of millions of tons of TNT.
Kherson should be evacuated immediately.
A multi-hundred foot chunk of the Nova Kakhovka dam is gone, the Kakhovka Reservoir is quickly emptying out into the Dnipro.
That Reservoir 18 km3 of fresh water which also supplies water to the Crimean peninsula, annexed by Russia in 2014, and to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, which is also under Russian control.
Ukrainians appear to be trying to flood Russians out of defensive positions.
Ukraine threatened to blow the dam last fall…one of the reasons the Russians withdrew from Kherson after evacuating 80,000 civilians.
I believe the power this dam provides to hydroelectric plant is also critical power source to the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant cooling systems.
This could have severe implications on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station that relies on the Kakhovka reservoir.
Not good.
Infographic that projects water rise if the Nova Kakhovka dam blew. pic.twitter.com/9EBc92ywmg
— Mats Nilsson (@mazzenilsson) June 6, 2023
UPDATE 12:04 AM EDT (TUESDAY) --
As I post this now very credible on the ground reports the first villages downstream are being totally flooded and washed away.
TOTAL devastation and still under more and more water.
those who were still residing there have no chance of survival - at all.
3 villages are gone already; the water is heading towards additional small towns.
I have no information about the emergency procedures, alerts or ability in war to evacuate those people, or the numbers affected yet. I might soon and will post it is reliable.
