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SPQR's avatar

Slavyangrad yesterday evening:

A clarification on the flooding of the left (southern) bank of the Dnepr in the Kherson Oblast:

1) Some of you may have forgotten, but soon after the Russian withdrawal from the right (northern) bank of the Dnepr, a large number of shoreline settlements were evacuated. Larger cities, like Novaya Kakhovka, Alyoshki, Golaya Pristan, and others, of course, could not be evacuated entirely. However, administrative service were moved from there. This likely was done in anticipation of the undermining of the dam.

2) Likewise, the Russian Army did not establish defensive lines right at the river bank. On the contrary, lines were established 20-30 km inland, with observation outposts maintained on Dnepr basin islands and along the shore. At the time, some staunch critics of the Russian command, including, if I am not mistaken, Strelkov, heavily criticized this decision, fearing that the Ukrainians could establish bridgeheads across the river. I said, at the time, that any such danger would be mitigated by the reach of the Russian artillery. Turns out, Russian military planning is not as naive as some would have you believe.

3) Accordingly, even though some Russian outposts in the basin were flooded, this was planned for. Light special forces infantry was able to withdraw from the flood area without any losses, and they had no heavy vehicles to worry about in their maneuver. The Kinburn Spit outposts and most of the island positions appear to remain unaffected. The Ukrainians, on the other hand, have withdrawn throughout.

I hope this clarifies the impact of the flooding on the Russian defensive lines. In short, there has been none, so far.

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JACk's avatar

The Kakhovka Dam was constructed as an earth-filled embankment dam using 1940s engineering practices during construction in 1950.

Given the construction method (dependence on earth fill) the dam is not nearly as impervious to demolition/ordnance damage as many people think. A lot of speculators insist that only an internal strike or placed charge could compromise the integrity of the dam. Or a singularly large missile. Not so.

Minor cracks give access to water and lead to seepage. Seepage leads to erosion, which leads to voids. Voids lead to weakening and, depending on how severe and how long repairs are withheld - failure. Of concern is the possibility that the Kakhovka dam may sit on a sand foundation. Once failure starts, there may not be a stop till either the dam completely fails or water levels drop enough to decrease pressure on what remains sufficiently to cease eroding what is left of the earth fill, foundation, and weakened structure.

Although what I'm about to say is speculative since I do not have design drawings nor did I inspect the dam post impact, I have been on it. I also served as a Combat Engineer Officer* in the USMC and a bridge unit commander. Amphibious crossings were our focus of effort, as was denial of such crossings. We built bridges and set charges to them. We also studied how to destroy dams.

Given recent rains and upstream release, Kakhovka Resevoir held a volume of water greater than 18.2 kilometers cubed or, 4,807,931,332,596.392 gallons of water.

It is hard to overstate the power of hydrolics and time. Minor cracks on an earth-filled dam can become catastrophic given the pressure pushing against the dam.

The natural unnatural theory is very plausible.

*USMC Combat Engineers generally defer to Army and Navy engineers for bonafide engineer needs. I mostly broke things or planned to break things.

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