Dexter Filkins, the writer of this piece, is also the author of one of the best non-fiction books I've ever read - The Forever War (not the space war book).
You've got to be kidding me. I started reading "The Forever War" (the space war book) based on some comments I read on here and I assure you that there wasn't any warning about the space war book.
Does the author typically write in such a narrative form? I had a hard time finishing this piece and normally very much enjoy descriptive writing. Perhaps it could have been more succinct.
You really should consider reading Ian M Banks's Culture series novels if you like that. He's widely considered to be the best sci-fi author in the UK (He's scottish).
I'd certainly put the culture series close to par with Ender's Game and the Dune novels. They're most excellent.
Also really enjoyed that book. The stories about the treatment of third country nationals (essentially contractors from countries like the Philippines and India working on US bases) were surprising and saddening.
I have a close friend that is is the Army Corps of Engineers at the dam. Despite being deployed to the dam months ago, she's seen sporadic time at the dam due to ISIS in the area. Every time they even get close the higher ups decide to evacuate the American engineers, can't say what's been decided for the others. During the recent Mosul Offensive, they were away from the dam the entire time.
She was also telling me that during the time that ISIS held the dam, they managed to booby trap the entire place. They had multiple Iraqi workers killed in bathrooms from traps set. However, ISIS didn't manage any real structural damage to the dam.
Amazing read, much longer than I generally get hooked into.
I am astonished that "Grouting" (A term i find like many in the engineering word makes a possibly questionable practice sound like a good idea) is a functional, let alone acceptable solution, I can only begin to imagine what the ground under that dam must look like after the last 20+ years of concrete being poured into it.
Way down the bottom, we see the problem is solved for at least the next year:
"Early in 2016, under American prodding, the Iraqis reopened negotiations with Trevi S.p.A., the Italian firm. In September, a team of engineers, hired at a cost of three hundred million dollars, arrived at the dam to perform a crash repair job. Their main task is to install updated equipment, designed to fill the voids beneath the dam more precisely, and to repair the broken control gate. Under the contract, the Italians will do the grouting for a year, and then leave the equipment with their Iraqi counterparts. The engineers say that they are confident they can prevent the dam’s foundation from washing away."
The sentence folllowing that starts with But. 'Crash repair job' also doesn't instill confidence that it is a given this will work.
Also, this dam still is close to a war zone, if not in a war zone. That updated equipment may not make it there, can get destroyed in an attack, or the personnel doing the work can be 'persuaded' not to work or may outright be killed.
What surprises me most about this story is that they kept delivering power to the enemy, while they also could have let all or most of the water out. It wouldn't surprise me if money or backstabbing ("we'll keep delivering electricity if you focus on attacking your other enemies instead of on getting back the dam from us") was involved there.
The article also says many experts are scared to death it is going to collapse, and a chart of dangerous dams puts it much higher than any other. I bet that one of the conditions the Iraqi government insisted on including in the contract with Trevi S.p.A is that it says to the public it is sure it can prevent a collapse.
I think people should trust independent experts much more than companies under contract from a very corrupt and incompetent government. Don't you agree?
> Kurdish officials intended to shut down the turbines, but American officials told them that this would add more water to the reservoir, making the dam more likely to burst. So isis continued to profit from the dam. “We wanted to strangle them, but we weren’t allowed,” a Kurdish official told me.
Not that destroying infrastructure and killing the power to a city of civilians, despite ISIS control, is necessarily a good idea, but could they not just cut the lines?
> Not that destroying infrastructure and killing the power to a city of civilians, despite ISIS control, is necessarily a good idea, but could they not just cut the lines?
Do you know what happens when you run a turbine with nowhere to put the load? 750MW is enough to boil something like a kiloton of water every hour, that energy needs to go somewhere.
The Masonry dam in Washington state near Seattle also has/had this problem. The geotechnical reports and conditions were ignored and the water flowed under and around the dam, popping up in all kinds of places.
The dam was never able to be filled and is just called the masonry dam since nobody wanted it named after them.
Masonry dam had quite a different problem which is just that there was too much water and it couldn't keep up, so water spilled over the side about 6000ft away from the dam. The problem with the Mosul dam is that it's built on soluble rock that could be swept away with enough pressure. Yes, too much water is the cause of both failures, but they're quite different.
> Up close, the work is wet, improvisatory, and deeply inexact. [...] Like his boss, Jabouri has worked at the dam since he was a young engineering graduate. Now, he told me, he is as sensitive to the dam’s changes as the electronic gear buzzing around him. [...]
“We feel our way through,” Jabouri said, standing by the pump. Generally, smaller cavities require thinner grout, so Jabouri started with a milky solution and increased its thickness as the void took more. Finally, after several hours, he stopped; his intuition, aided by the pressure gauges, told him that the cavity was full.
The irony saddens me that, if you replaced that worker and his human lifetime of knowledge with a "data-driven control system" and his intuition with a "machine learning algorithm", we would all hail the result as the pinnacle of technology in mainantence systems - even though the data and actual descision making would be almost the same...
What happens if Jabouri gets hit by a bus? I love a good craftsman as much as anyone, but when the lives of that many people rely on one person, you're just asking for a disaster.
I came here to note this. People bring this up every year or so - when I was in Iraq in 2006, this was an issue of the "any moment they could all die" sort but nobody seems to care enough to fix it since there isn't a firm timeline for the dam failure. Also, there's that whole war thing going on.
> In private, some Iraqis pose conspiracy theories. “I know a lot of Iraqis who think this is just a big psyops operation by the U.S. government—senior officials, not just Iraqis on the street,”
Of course. When a foreign army invade your country, then proceed to criticize your infrastructure, they make themselves difficult to listen to. Even if they are right. If Iraqis had concerns wouldn't they involved third party inspections from non-American firms?
What the Iraqis should do is not just believe every conspiracy theory that comes along, but carefully investigate each one to see if it makes sense. From what I understand, they don't generally do this.
I'm curious to what ratio an abusive regime is affected by general sanctions vs the populace under its authoritarian control. Sad to see so many people living in poverty from a dictator, then sanctions, then an invasion, now ISIS (And a dam apparently).
I don't know what the solution is, but that area of the world just cannot find peace.
> Sad to see so many people living in poverty from a dictator
Iraq was an urbanized country with effective national healthcare, homegrown industries, plenty of agriculture and natural resources and a high standard of living relative to its neighbors before the Gulf War. However, it is true that Saddam Hussein did significant damage to the country's economy by engaging in genocide and the devastating Iran-Iraq war. His brutality in suppressing anyone he thought was opposing him was truly awful. Still, it needs to be kept in mind that the current day Iraqi economy in shambles is significantly the work of sanctions that did nothing to weaken the totalitarian regime's grip on power and an invasion that devastated the country, replaced the regime with a new kleptocratic government, and sold many of the country's resources to international entities.
> I'm curious to what ratio an abusive regime is affected by general sanctions vs the populace under its authoritarian control.
Inevitably the sanctions will hurt the general populace more than the people in power. However, that might reduce the popularity of the leader and ultimately help their downfall, perhaps.
According to quora you need about 10000m2 or one 1ha to produce 1MW. So 1000 * 10000m2 = 10km2 to produce 1GW.
I wonder how big the lake is? Could solar panels installed in the drained lake - theoretically - provide the same or more energy than the dam?
Of course energy storage is a major part of water power and it is not taken into account above.
On the other hand a decentralized power grid is one of the major advantages of solar (especially in an unstable country) and that is not taken into account either.
The problem isn't just one of power. It's also (ironically) flood management. That reservoir allows Iraq to store water from years of plenty (and prevent downstream flooding) for years of drought when that extra water will be needed for farming, drinking, etc.
You'd need twice as many panels because panels generate very little power at night whereas the dam continues to run.
Also you'd need a battery bank to hold half a days worth of electricity. You could try pumped storage... oh wait this is kinda the problem here isn't it, so that's not happening.
Theoretically a drought would have more sunny days and less water, so solar and dam do loosely speaking work together although the coupling isn't that tight for a long river.
I rarely like The New Yorker writings, but this is actually a good one. Importantly, because it starts with short description of a whole, and then goes into the detail. Most The New Yorker writers consider it ok to start (and continue) the article with something like: "On a warm sunny autumn day he was sitting in the park, wearing his grey merino-wool polo shirt and khaki pants".
The only thing I'd like to be explained more thoroughly: what actually is this dam? I.e., how does it work? Going to wikipedia I see a whole list of different types of dams, and it is not clear to me, what does this specific construction in the article actually do, and how its failure would cause a tsunami-like wave.
Because this particular dam happens to be upstream to some large population centres, back in 2007 they estimated half-million people could be killed and several millions displaced, that figure might be higher today.
[+] [-] 21|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jxramos|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] icosoheadroom|9 years ago|reply
https://www.google.com/maps/place/Haditha,+Iraq/@34.2573113,...
I guess it doesn't have the same structural problems, related to a bad soil.
[+] [-] impostervt|9 years ago|reply
The Forever War https://www.amazon.com/dp/0307279448/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_OWDy...
[+] [-] reactor4|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sporkenfang|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] SEJeff|9 years ago|reply
I'd certainly put the culture series close to par with Ender's Game and the Dune novels. They're most excellent.
[+] [-] ra1n85|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] griffinkelly|9 years ago|reply
She was also telling me that during the time that ISIS held the dam, they managed to booby trap the entire place. They had multiple Iraqi workers killed in bathrooms from traps set. However, ISIS didn't manage any real structural damage to the dam.
[+] [-] verelo|9 years ago|reply
I am astonished that "Grouting" (A term i find like many in the engineering word makes a possibly questionable practice sound like a good idea) is a functional, let alone acceptable solution, I can only begin to imagine what the ground under that dam must look like after the last 20+ years of concrete being poured into it.
[+] [-] Hondor|9 years ago|reply
"Early in 2016, under American prodding, the Iraqis reopened negotiations with Trevi S.p.A., the Italian firm. In September, a team of engineers, hired at a cost of three hundred million dollars, arrived at the dam to perform a crash repair job. Their main task is to install updated equipment, designed to fill the voids beneath the dam more precisely, and to repair the broken control gate. Under the contract, the Italians will do the grouting for a year, and then leave the equipment with their Iraqi counterparts. The engineers say that they are confident they can prevent the dam’s foundation from washing away."
[+] [-] Someone|9 years ago|reply
Also, this dam still is close to a war zone, if not in a war zone. That updated equipment may not make it there, can get destroyed in an attack, or the personnel doing the work can be 'persuaded' not to work or may outright be killed.
What surprises me most about this story is that they kept delivering power to the enemy, while they also could have let all or most of the water out. It wouldn't surprise me if money or backstabbing ("we'll keep delivering electricity if you focus on attacking your other enemies instead of on getting back the dam from us") was involved there.
[+] [-] woodandsteel|9 years ago|reply
I think people should trust independent experts much more than companies under contract from a very corrupt and incompetent government. Don't you agree?
[+] [-] chris_7|9 years ago|reply
Not that destroying infrastructure and killing the power to a city of civilians, despite ISIS control, is necessarily a good idea, but could they not just cut the lines?
[+] [-] Tuna-Fish|9 years ago|reply
Do you know what happens when you run a turbine with nowhere to put the load? 750MW is enough to boil something like a kiloton of water every hour, that energy needs to go somewhere.
[+] [-] subway|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] snowwindwaves|9 years ago|reply
The dam was never able to be filled and is just called the masonry dam since nobody wanted it named after them.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cedar_River_(Washington)
[+] [-] mynameisvlad|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unethical_ban|9 years ago|reply
That's a magnitude of difference.
[+] [-] xg15|9 years ago|reply
> Up close, the work is wet, improvisatory, and deeply inexact. [...] Like his boss, Jabouri has worked at the dam since he was a young engineering graduate. Now, he told me, he is as sensitive to the dam’s changes as the electronic gear buzzing around him. [...]
“We feel our way through,” Jabouri said, standing by the pump. Generally, smaller cavities require thinner grout, so Jabouri started with a milky solution and increased its thickness as the void took more. Finally, after several hours, he stopped; his intuition, aided by the pressure gauges, told him that the cavity was full.
The irony saddens me that, if you replaced that worker and his human lifetime of knowledge with a "data-driven control system" and his intuition with a "machine learning algorithm", we would all hail the result as the pinnacle of technology in mainantence systems - even though the data and actual descision making would be almost the same...
[+] [-] tw04|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] taspeotis|9 years ago|reply
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11209228
[+] [-] jamesfe|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Fiahil|9 years ago|reply
Of course. When a foreign army invade your country, then proceed to criticize your infrastructure, they make themselves difficult to listen to. Even if they are right. If Iraqis had concerns wouldn't they involved third party inspections from non-American firms?
[+] [-] woodandsteel|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kiba|9 years ago|reply
But I won't be surprised to wake up tomorrow to learn that there's a humanitarian crisis in Iraq.
[+] [-] nothrabannosir|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] exabrial|9 years ago|reply
I don't know what the solution is, but that area of the world just cannot find peace.
[+] [-] danharaj|9 years ago|reply
Iraq was an urbanized country with effective national healthcare, homegrown industries, plenty of agriculture and natural resources and a high standard of living relative to its neighbors before the Gulf War. However, it is true that Saddam Hussein did significant damage to the country's economy by engaging in genocide and the devastating Iran-Iraq war. His brutality in suppressing anyone he thought was opposing him was truly awful. Still, it needs to be kept in mind that the current day Iraqi economy in shambles is significantly the work of sanctions that did nothing to weaken the totalitarian regime's grip on power and an invasion that devastated the country, replaced the regime with a new kleptocratic government, and sold many of the country's resources to international entities.
[+] [-] TazeTSchnitzel|9 years ago|reply
Inevitably the sanctions will hurt the general populace more than the people in power. However, that might reduce the popularity of the leader and ultimately help their downfall, perhaps.
[+] [-] jokoon|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rem1313|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gardarh|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lldata|9 years ago|reply
According to wikipedia the dam produces 1052MW. Let's call it 1GW. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosul_Dam
According to quora you need about 10000m2 or one 1ha to produce 1MW. So 1000 * 10000m2 = 10km2 to produce 1GW.
I wonder how big the lake is? Could solar panels installed in the drained lake - theoretically - provide the same or more energy than the dam?
Of course energy storage is a major part of water power and it is not taken into account above. On the other hand a decentralized power grid is one of the major advantages of solar (especially in an unstable country) and that is not taken into account either.
[+] [-] impostervt|9 years ago|reply
It's also there to regulate the flow of the river, which commonly floods the surrounding, crop-growing region.
[+] [-] etrevino|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] VLM|9 years ago|reply
Also you'd need a battery bank to hold half a days worth of electricity. You could try pumped storage... oh wait this is kinda the problem here isn't it, so that's not happening.
Theoretically a drought would have more sunny days and less water, so solar and dam do loosely speaking work together although the coupling isn't that tight for a long river.
[+] [-] krick|9 years ago|reply
The only thing I'd like to be explained more thoroughly: what actually is this dam? I.e., how does it work? Going to wikipedia I see a whole list of different types of dams, and it is not clear to me, what does this specific construction in the article actually do, and how its failure would cause a tsunami-like wave.
[+] [-] magaman69|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jpkeisala|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] huxley|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] marcusgarvey|9 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rdc12|9 years ago|reply
[1] http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/one-of-africas-bigges...
[+] [-] unknown|9 years ago|reply
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