The Aftermath of the Dams Breaking

A little bit of background for these pictures.  Water levels have been up considerably in Michigan for the past couple of years.  The Great Lakes are higher than I've seen them in a long time.  Many of the inland Lakes are also experiencing in high levels.  Mid-Michigan was experiencing heavy rains April and early May.

Eventually, those rains caused the Edenville Dam to fail on May 19, 2020.  This caused water to be released into the Tittabawassee River which then flowed into Sanford Lake which then toppled the Sanford Dam.  This caused massive flooding in Midland and Saginaw.

Well it turns out that Federal Regulators realized that there was an issue with the dams back in 2010 but the private owner failed to do the required upgrades (in fact, he demanded that the people who lived around the lakes should pay for the repairs).  His dam license was finally revoked in 2018.  It was then that the state of Michigan tried to get the repairs.

I hate to think of the cost of the damage created by these dams but I have to believe it is extensive.

 This is one of the bridges out of Sanford.  As you can see, it sustained quite a bit of damage from the flood waters.  Sanford Lake was a man made lake that was created by one of these dams.  Now it is barely a river.  There are a ton of houses around it that are no longer lakefront property, so I would imagine property values in the area will plummet.

 Another view of the bridge.

 The flood waters washed up several trees.

 Many of those trees crashed into this former railroad bridge.

 Another shot of that.

 I'm not sure if this railing was toppled by the flood waters, but if it was, if gives you the idea of the tremendous power of water.

 Another shot of that.

 I think this used to be Sanford Lake.  If you see the dock near the back, that is where it used to go to.  I think the plan is the refill the lake but that will probably take a few years.

This is the Edenville Bridge.

As a result of this incident, it was determined that a large number of dams in Michigan structurally deficient.  It was also determined that many of those are in private hands.  If the owners of those dams are like the owner of these dams, the dams should be seized and the owners should be forced to pay for all of the necessary repairs.

At any rate, I am pretty sure this story is not through as I'm pretty sure that many of the people that own houses along this lake will sue.  And that will probably lead to the dam owner filing bankruptcy or something.....