North Dakota lake swallows land and buildings

I just found this article about an undrainable lake that has begun to swallow towns, and is now on the brink of overflow. I thought it was pretty interesting. Ive never heard anything about this and actually didnt realize that lakes could hold water like that.

From the source....

DEVILS LAKE, N.D. – It's been called a slow-growing monster: a huge lake that has steadily expanded over the last 20 years, swallowing up thousands of acres, hundreds of buildings and at least two towns in its rising waters.

These people need to get some kind of drainage and fast. If this lake overflows, who knows how much devistation this could cause. Anyone from North Dakota on here that has any knowledge of this lake?

More from the source...

No other place in America has faced such a dilemma. The nation's only other significant "closed-basin" lake is the Great Salt Lake, which was in danger of flooding housing developments in the mid-1980s. But shortly after the state spent $70 million on huge pumps, a dry spell began. Those pumps now stand idle.

Anywho. I hope they get this lake under control and fast. property and peoples livelyhoods are at stake here.

MOTF!

source

This is a FRESH water lake. Fresh water is a dying thing.
They should just let nature take its course and consider it a blessing.
Seven more feet and it will drain into a river.
They should just plan accordingly.

Man has only mucked up what nature does.
Here in Florida a few years ago some people thought it would be really nice if a certain river was made straight instead ov the usual curvy. Well, they have been working on restoring it for the past few years to its natural curvy lines.

reply to post by OhZone


I agree. And the sad thing is that when this happened in the past, humans just moved. Now because of the illusion of "ownership", we feel too attached to our few hundred square feet of soil.

reply to post by rogerstigers


Well they are going to have to detach themselves or either get some hellified scuba gear.

MOTF!

Devil's Lake is in the neighbourhood, so I've watched it come up... and up... and up... for the past 20 years or so. Prior to that, it was lower than average, as I recall. It's not super unique (there's a rest stop in Minnesota on I-94 that I used to stop at which is now closed because the lake it used to be near is now in the parking lot) but Devil's Lake is a big honkin' body of water (in a state not known for them,) so it's pretty dramatic.

However, the real problem here is political and environmental. There is a manmade Devil's Lake outlet, on the east end of the lake, but that dumps into the Sheyenne River, which goes into the Red River, which goes into... Canada. The Canadians aren't keen on water (and critters) from Devil's Lake getting into Lake Winnipeg and the other waterways, so it keeps getting tied up.

I had heard, quite a few years ago, that the lake had a natural outlet that would "spring" into action (har-har) once the lake got to a certain level, ending the legal wrangling, but that was either incorrect, or the lake has to rise to ridiculous levels for it to matter, as we're still arguing about the manmade outlet.

With the insane winds we've had for the past couple of days, they had some awesome footage of the lake basically taking out a road with 50MPH whipped waves on the news tonight.

reply to post by adjensen


Wow do you have a link to that news video? Sounds very interesting.

MOTF!

reply to post by MessOnTheFED!


Here ya go. Forgive the poor quality of reporting, we're something of the "warm up bullpen" of journalists around here, lol.
www.wdaz.com...