Dams

The Bush Administration gave environmentalists a major victory Tuesday--and infuriated Denver's business and political elite--with a formal proposal to veto construction of the Two Forks Dam, a giant water project that had enjoyed unswerving support from the Ronald Reagan Administration.

A pair of perfectly shaped lips. The tip of a tilted nose. From under the rust-colored ground, a delicate face begins to emerge. "It's Aphrodite," cries a young man covered in dust as he gently unearths the figurine. "And she's in ivory." Umit Alagoz is among a handful of archeologists battling to salvage whatever treasures they can from Zeugma, a unique Greco-Roman site in Turkey's southern Gaziantep province near the Syrian border.

Ron Good surveys the high-walled splendor of this prehistoric corner of Yosemite National Park and solemnly promises to renew the long-dormant environmental battle that broke the spirit of famed naturalist John Muir. "Look what humans have done here," he scowls. "Trust me; this will not stand."

Heavy rains caused a large dam to burst Thursday in a remote area of southwestern Pakistan, sweeping villagers into the Arabian Sea and leaving more than 400 people missing, a provincial official said today. At least 20 people were confirmed dead after the 485-foot-long Shakidor Dam burst near Pasni, on the Arabian Sea coast about 120 miles from the Iranian border, provincial Cabinet minister Sher Jan Baluch said. Many times that number were unaccounted for.

Water pressing against a battered wooden dam continued to recede, and officials planned to pump more out in hopes of doing repairs before an expected second weekend of heavy rain. The dam's status remained critical, and a state of emergency was still in effect in Taunton, a city of 56,000 south of Boston, Mayor Robert G. Nunes said.

Fearing a dam break that could cause catastrophic flooding in Kentucky and Tennessee, the Army Corps of Engineers has begun lowering the water level on Lake Cumberland. The measure was aimed at reducing pressure on the weakened 240-foot-high dam, said Lt. Col. Steven J. Roemhildt. "We must take this emergency action to reduce risk to the public and to the dam itself," he said.

Opponents of the Lang Ranch dam project won their first court battle Friday, persuading a judge to spare 40 oak trees at the Thousand Oaks site--at least for two weeks. After hearing arguments from the Save Lang Oaks Fund, Judge Thomas J. Hutchins in Ventura County Superior Court agreed to issue a temporary restraining order blocking the county's plans to cut the trees on Monday to make way for the dam.

The Environmental Protection Agency approved a plan for removing the Milltown Dam near Missoula and cleaning up mine tailings tainted with arsenic, copper, lead and zinc that have accumulated for decades behind the aging structure. The approval clears the way for construction of a bypass channel in the Clark Fork River to begin next year and removal of the dam in 2006.

The state's chief expert on dam safety says an environmental impact report is unnecessary for repair work at the leaking Garvey Reservoir in Monterey Park. Monterey Park officials had requested that the state conduct extensive geological and environmental studies on the impact of repairs on two large cracks in the reservoir. The damage, discovered in the last month, had contributed to flooding around nearby homes and prompted the closure and draining of the reservoir.

The Bureau of Reclamation has awarded a $375,000 contract to a Utah construction company for modifications to the spillway gates at Glen Canyon Dam in northern Arizona, bureau spokesman Barry Wirth said. The contract with G.V. Contracting, Midvale, Utah, calls for removal of the flashboards on four of the huge spillway gates at the dam and installation of reinforcements on the gate arms, Wirth said.