Analysis of Dam Failures & Development of a Dam Safety Evaluation Tool

Dam safety is becoming an increasingly critical issue in the U.S. Many of our nation's dams are deficient and at risk of failure. A dam failure can be a disastrous event with catastrophic consequences to the downstream area and the surrounding environment. Inundation from dam failures have the potential for immense damage to property, the economy, environment, and human life. Many U.S. dams were built in first half of the 20th century and suffer from aging, deterioration, and poor engineering standards. The goals of this study are to increase situational awareness of dam owners and regulators, provide a user friendly dam safety evaluation tool, and improve the nation's overall dam safety. The methods to achieve these goals include three steps: 1) Review and compile relevant dam safety background information such as different dam materials, designs, common failure causes, and proper inspection techniques; 2) Analyze recent dam failure and incident data from the Significant Incident Reporting database and provide recommendations for future incident reporting; 3) Create a Knowledge Based Expert System computer program as a tool to evaluate the overall safety level of an existing dam.