flood control

In much the same way that human actions suppress fire regimes, they also control water levels, and the resulting changes can have important consequences for endangered species. An example of a species so affected is the Cape Sable seaside sparrow (Ammodramus maritimus mirabilis)…

…is also serious, because the floodwater erodes the foundations at the downstream toe. Arch dams possess greater resistance to failure after overtopping.

…after a catastrophic North Sea flood on February 1, 1953, which killed 1,836 people and devastated 2,070 square km (800 square miles) of land in the southwestern Netherlands. Construction of the Delta Works began shortly thereafter and was completed in 1986. The Delta Works is recognized as one of the…

…to the maintenance of river estuaries as efficient means for the discharge of inland runoff. In many places, without continuous attention to such maintenance, the coincidence of high tides with heavy rainfall would lead to frequent disastrous flooding of inhabited areas.

…history, China has attempted to control the Huang He by building overflow channels and increasingly taller dikes, and in 1955 the Chinese embarked on an ambitious 50-year construction plan and flood-control program. This program included extensive dike construction, repair, and reinforcement, reforestation in the loess region, and the construction of…

…of the city’s levee and flood-protection system. In some parts of the city, levees and sea walls were not tall enough to hold back the water; in others floodgates did not close properly, and some structures collapsed entirely. Complicating matters was the fact that many parts of the New Orleans…

…availability and in dealing with floods, droughts, land drainage, and soil erosion. Rainfalls vary both within and between rainstorms, sometimes dramatically, depending on the type and scale of the storm and its velocity of movement. Within a storm, the average intensity tends to decrease with an increase in the storm…

…produced by the rainy season flooded surrounding areas and spilled over southward into the Everglades. Lake communities include Pahokee, Belle Glade, South Bay, Clewiston, and Okeechobee. A Seminole reservation is near the northwestern shore of the lake.

…stream or river channel to prevent flooding of the adjacent land. Artificial levees are typically needed to control the flow of rivers meandering through broad, flat floodplains. Levees are usually embankments of dirt built wide enough so that they will not collapse or be eroded when saturated with moisture from…

In the lower basin, flood control and water management offer major opportunities to increase economic productivity. Farmers practicing shifting cultivation on the uplands and the rice growers on the rain-fed lowlands are able, under normal conditions, to grow only one crop a year,…

Flood control along the river dates to the foundation of New Orleans in 1717 by the French, who built a small levee to shelter their infant city. Over the next two centuries a complex array of riverbank structures was erected along the river…

The principal area for land-reclamation and flood-control projects has been the Netherlands, where reclaiming areas behind the line of coastal dunes along the North Sea has been in progress for centuries. During the 1930s the Dutch constructed a dike 19 miles (31 km)…

The greatest concern in the management of the Thames has been the risk of flooding. Its waters have been rising at the rate of 2.8 feet (0.9 meter) per century. The record floods of 1791 reached a height of 14 feet (4.3 meters)…