Bulletin 1.pdf - California Department of Water Resources - State of ...

WATER RESOURCES OF CALIFORNIA 537
FLOOD FLOWS
Floods in streams and dry washes of the Colorado Desert Area are
generally local in nature. While damage resulting from them has occasionally
been severe, it has been mainly limited to highways and railroads,
and to canals in the Imperial Valley. Principal cause of these
local floods has been summer cloudbursts. Because of lack of available
data, no studies of flood frequencies in the Area have been attempted
during the present investigation. Flood flows in Colorado River are
related to the entire Colorado River Basin and are discussed generally
in Appendix E.
As a matter of historical interest, a flood of great magnitude in the
Colorado Desert Area resulted in 1905 and 1906 from an uncontrolled
diversion from Colorado River into Imperial Valley. On May 17, 1904,
the California Development Company, through a Mexican subsidiary,
"La Sociedad de Reigos y Terrenos de la Baja Oalifornia," was granted
a right by the Mexican Government to convey through Mexico, to the
United States, water diverted in the United States or in Mexico and, in
addition, a right to divert 10,000 second-feet of water from the Colorado
River in Mexico for such purpose.
Because of physical difficulty experienced in diverting water from
the Colorado in the United States, two dredger cuts were made from the
river in Mexico to accomplish this diversion. The cuts extended to the
Alamo Canal, also known as the Imperial Canal, and the first was immediately
below, and the second about four miles below the International
Boundary. Pending approval by the Mexican Government of the right to
install control gates in these cuts, none was constructed, but water neverthe
less was diverted into Alamo Canal. Unprecedented floods from
Gila River in Arizona during the winter of 1904-05 made closing of the
lower cut imperative, but efforts to do this were unavailing. This cut,
originally 60 feet wide, had been greatly enlarged by the river, as had
also the Alamo Canal below the cut. By August, 1905, the entire
Colorado was running through the cut into Imperial Canal, and through
Imperial Valley into Salton Sink. Throughout 1906 strenuous efforts to
turn the river permanently back into its old channel toward the Gulf of
California were unsuccessful. Although the river had been confined to
its old channel on November 4,1906, following completion of Hind Dam,
a second break occurred on December 7th. On December 20th, at the
request of President Theodore Roosevelt, the Southern Pacific Company
started on a second closure. This was finally accomplished on February
19, 1907, with completion of Clarke Dam, which permanently re-established
the river in its previous channel. Estimated cost of twice turning
back the river exceeded $2,000,000, and widespread damage, estimated
to be more than $8,000,000, was caused by flooding. Of recent years, more
than 40 years after the closure, the United States paid the Southern
Pacific Company over $1,000,000 as compensation for its expenditures
in closing the break. Among principal flood losses were virtual destruction
of 13,000 acres of agricultural land of which 3,000 acres was under
cultivation at the time, extensive damage to the main line of the Southern
Pacific Company, scouring of the channels of New and Alamo Rivers,
and extensive destruction to portions of the town of Mexicali.