Local authorities are looking for whoever meddled with the HorseThief Reservoir spillway controls last week, releasing about 135 million gallons of water.
The incident apparently occurred around midnight Thursday, when U.S. Geological Survey monitoring equipment recorded a marked increase in downstream water flow.
Several hours later, an employee for an engineering firm on the HorseThief project discovered the vandalism and notified the Hodgeman County Sheriff's Office. When officers arrived at the scene, they learned that someone had tampered with one of the locked spillway control mechanisms and partially opened the spillway gate.
"There's a chain and a padlock, and it was disassembled so it could be opened," Sheriff Ron Ridley told the Globe on Tuesday. "And then it was reassembled so there wouldn't be any appearance that it had been tampered with."
Ridley said he notified the Kansas Bureau of Investigation about the incident, since the uncontrolled release of water could have threatened public safety.
Reservoir officials estimate that approximately 135 million gallons of water were released due to the vandalism. But there was no immediate danger to life or property during the release because the water was released through the spillway system, and because the lake was still filling up with water when the incident occurred.
Ridley said that authorities are still investigating the incident and have not identified any suspects.
"It could be a variety of things," he said. "It could be a disgruntled employee, it could be someone that was opposed to the dam. We don't have a motive at this point."
Ridley said that the control mechanism wasn't complicated, so tampering with it wouldn't require any specialized knowledge. But he said whoever did it would have needed to bring along the necessary tools.
Anyone with information about the incident should call the sheriff's office at (620) 357-8391.
Reach Eric Swanson at (620) 408-9917 or e-mail him at eric.swanson@dodgeglobe.com.
|
|
|
Local authorities are looking for whoever meddled with the HorseThief Reservoir spillway controls last week, releasing about 135 million gallons of water.
The incident apparently occurred around midnight Thursday, when U.S. Geological Survey monitoring equipment recorded a marked increase in downstream water flow.
Several hours later, an employee for an engineering firm on the HorseThief project discovered the vandalism and notified the Hodgeman County Sheriff's Office. When officers arrived at the scene, they learned that someone had tampered with one of the locked spillway control mechanisms and partially opened the spillway gate.
"There's a chain and a padlock, and it was disassembled so it could be opened," Sheriff Ron Ridley told the Globe on Tuesday. "And then it was reassembled so there wouldn't be any appearance that it had been tampered with."
Ridley said he notified the Kansas Bureau of Investigation about the incident, since the uncontrolled release of water could have threatened public safety.
Reservoir officials estimate that approximately 135 million gallons of water were released due to the vandalism. But there was no immediate danger to life or property during the release because the water was released through the spillway system, and because the lake was still filling up with water when the incident occurred.
Ridley said that authorities are still investigating the incident and have not identified any suspects.
"It could be a variety of things," he said. "It could be a disgruntled employee, it could be someone that was opposed to the dam. We don't have a motive at this point."
Ridley said that the control mechanism wasn't complicated, so tampering with it wouldn't require any specialized knowledge. But he said whoever did it would have needed to bring along the necessary tools.
Anyone with information about the incident should call the sheriff's office at (620) 357-8391.
Reach Eric Swanson at (620) 408-9917 or e-mail him at eric.swanson@dodgeglobe.com.
