Flaming Gorge Reservoir

Yeah, the three reservoirs are called units.

Northernmost is Flaming Gorge Reservoir.

It's the biggest.

It's about 3.6 million acre feet of storage capacity.

It provided the storage that they thought was necessary.

And there were different interpretations of how much storage was needed based on the assumptions and initial conditions of the modeling and that kind of stuff, but it was anywhere from 23 to 30 million.

The combined storage of the Lake Glen Canyon Dam, Lake Powell, and the two initial units, Flaming Gorge and the Keurig County, now Aspinall unit, provided that 30 million acre-feet.

So it gave the assurances that the upper basin states based on our understanding of the hydrology of the time could develop water their share of the river and meet their compact obligations it was considered a big deal a secondary function but an important one was that these reservoirs would produce hydropower, most of the hydropower is produced at Glen Canyon Dam, and a portion of those revenues from hydropower would be used to subsidize other projects in the basin, and those were called participating projects.

So these upstream releases, essentially, let's think about what's happening this year.

We're focused on Flaming Gorge.

That's a reservoir in Wyoming.

Earlier this year, officials decided that they would do these emergency releases again.

Chapter 5.

From Green River City to Flaming Gorge.

In the summer of 1867, with a small party of naturalists, students, and amateurs like myself, I visited the mountain region of Colorado Territory.

While in Middle Park I explored a little canyon through which the Grand River runs immediately below the now well-known watering place, Middle Park Hot Springs.

The great mass of the mountain ridge through which the gorge is cut is composed of bright vermilion rocks, but they are surrounded by broad bands of mottled buff and gray, and these bands come down with a gentle curve to the water's edge on the nearer slopes of the mountain.

This is the head of the first of the canyons we are about to explore, an introductory one to a series made by the river through this range.

We name it Flaming Gorge.

The cliffs, or walls, we find on measurement to be about twelve hundred feet high.

Uh, we have, uh, one rancher you talk with says he wants his water back.

The Flaming Gorge reservoir, the draw down to get Powell and Mead up to where they should be.

Now, that water's gone.

How are you gonna get it back?

They assist us that we henceforth be no more children tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive.

For scout camp this summer, we took our scouts to Flaming Gorge.

One day, we rafted the Green River below Flaming Gorge Dam.

They were letting extra water out of the dam, so the currents in the river were impressive.

Each raft had a guide who told us how and when to stroke.

There were two or three things I was going to try to get done this year.

And one of them was to go to Flaming Gorge and check out the low water.

We had a boat on Flaming Gorge for about 10 years.

So I really know the area well.

And I'm looking forward to that trip, but with a little trepidation because I...

Of course it was named for a Cheyenne guy, you know, uh, famous Mead, I can't think of his first name now, but he was the grandfather of water law in the whole country.

Elwood Mead, but named after a Wyoming guy.

Anyway, I think that taking all that water out of Flaming Gorge, all it did is destroy a spectacular fishery, and they were worried by drawing it down, it might wipe out the kokanee salmon, which, oh my gosh, the kokanee salmon Jake, that is heaven on earth to eat a kokanee salmon out of that lake.

So you have the North slope and the South slope on the North slope.

You've got that section and then you're coming in and you're hitting dirt roads to get to any of the other trails until you get all the way to Flaming Gorge, kind of on the east end.

And then there's a two lane highway that goes through on that side, but that's kind of the low tapered off area.

So there's not as much, activity in that area.

Tune in on Thursday at 10 o'clock when hosts Greg Skordas and Holly Richardson go back to talk to eyewitnesses who were there that day and discuss where the trial for his alleged murderer stands.

People visiting Flaming Gorge Reservoir over the holiday may have noticed water levels much lower than usual.

The Bureau of Reclamation is sending large amounts of water downstream to help out struggling Lake Powell.

KSL Newsradio's Brianna Willis reports.

The Bureau will be sending around a million acre-feet of water from Flaming Gorge to the lake.

Utah's Colorado River Authority Executive Director Amy Haas says this can only be a temporary solution.

One of the things that we're committed to in Utah is making sure that any water that gets released from this facility is fully returned or recovered.