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County's Isabella dam evacuation plan: Get out of water's path

BY JAMES BURGER, Californian staff writer
e-mail:jburger@bakersfield.com | Tuesday, Dec 18 2007 11:15 AM

Last Updated: Tuesday, Dec 18 2007 1:19 PM

Kern County supervisors moved, Tuesday, to start funding systems to alert the public to a collapse of dams at Isabella Lake.

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Photos:

Photo by Casey Christie

Three workers are seen on the Isabella Lake Auxiliary Dam last month.

PDF:

• See a report on what would happen if Isabella Dam failed

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The likelihood of a catastrophic failure of the two dams at Isabella Lake isn't high, according to the experts.

But the risk does exist.

And Kern County Supervisors want people to know, sooner rather then later, how to escape flood waters if the dam breaks.

"Things happen when you're moving. They don't happen when you're not. Now we're moving," said Supervisor Mike Maggard.

Kern County Fire Chief Dennis Thompson presented an evacuation plan to Supervisors Tuesday.

It is a plan based on 30-year-old flooding estimates. New information is expected to update the plan in 2008.

The basic concepts behind the evacuation plan are common sense.

1) Get out of the path of flood waters or,

2) Get to higher elevations.

The town of Lake Isabella would be at the largest risk Thompson said, "due to the limited amount of time to react to the disaster."

That community would have less than 30 minutes to escape the flood.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers believes, Thompson said, that they will be able to tell if the dam is failing before there is a break.

That notification would give the people of Lake Isabella more time to escape the floods.

And time is the key to survival for people directly below the dam, Thompson said.

Lake Isabella residents would either drive toward Kernville or Ridgecrest to get above the Isabella Lake dam.

Or they would drive up Caliente Bodfish Road to get above the flood waters.

People in the Kern River Canyon should drive down the canyon to Bakersfield.

But, "driving reasonably, the water is going to be right at your heels," Thompson warned.

As the waters enter Bakersfield they will spread out to the west, north and south in a massive fan that could reach out past Interstate 5, covering almost all of the metropolitan area.

Bakersfield residents are encouraged to travel out of the city on major routes or head to safe areas which include East High School, North High School, Bakersfield College and the East Hills Mall.

Primary evacuation routes could have signs placed on them.

Several options for alerting the public to a dam collapse were also presented Tuesday.

They included:

• A system of sirens stretching from the dam to Bakersfield at the price of between $700,000 to $1 million.

• Television and radio alerts.

• E-mail and cell phone alerts.

• Door-to-door emergency sweeps.

Supervisors committed to finding $200,000, immediately, to begin funding some of the options for notifying the community about a dam collapse.

"I don't want to be in a position where we're doing nothing. But I don't think were in a position to say, today, we'll do it all," said Supervisor Jon McQuiston, in making the motion.

Smoking in parks

Supervisors agreed to post signs around children's playgrounds in county parks indicating there is a law that prevents smoking nearby.

But they wouldn't go any further, banning smoking in larger sections of parks.