Off the Publisher’s Desk – 4-12-2017

Lots of world news!

There sure is a lot of world news that I could be writing about this week, including the missile launch in the Middle East, the confirmation of a new Supreme Court Justice, a Navy force heading toward North Korea and that former President Obama and Susan Rice have some explaining to do.

But, this week I would like to write about our winter vacation to the warm southwest and Hoover Dam.

Paula and I left Glenwood City the last day of January and headed south, first to Little Rock and then to Sedona, AZ where we spent a week of rest and relaxation.

After that, we moved on toward Las Vegas and spent the better part of one day at Hoover Dam and on Lake Mead. We have visited Hoover Dam several times over the many years when we passed by. But this was the first time since 9-11 that we had the chance to go into the dam and take the elevator to the power house and tour the inside of the monstrous structure. The dam was built during the Depression back in the 1930s and has enough concrete in it to build a two-lane highway from California to New York.

The dam impounds the water of the Colorado River and creates Lake Mead, which is the largest reservoir in the United States with a surface area of some 247 square miles.

Our guide informed us that the lake was about 135 feet below what is considered full, but he also noted that over the past several months the lake level is increasing. If you look at the picture above, the light color walls of the canyon is the high water level of Lake Mead. That picture I took while we were on a boat on Lake Mead and were informed that there was over 500 feet of water below us. Our guide noted that with all the snowfall in the mountains the lake should see an increase in its level by spring.

According to Wikipedia, the lake level was at its lowest on July 1 of last year at 1071 feet above sea level, which is about 150 feet below the spillways of Hoover Dam.

In the background of the picture is the Hoover Dam bypass bridge carrying highway 93 over the river. The bridge is downstream from the dam and some 900 feet above the river. If you get a chance to cross the bridge on the Nevada side is a place to park your vehicle and walk onto the bridge and view the dam and Lake Mead. It is worth your time.

The bridge is called the Mike O’Callaghan/Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge. O’ Callaghan is a former governor of Nevada, and Pat Tillman gave up playing football for the Arizona Cardinals to serve his country and was killed by friendly fire in Afghanistan. The bridge was completed in 2010 and speeds up the time to travel from those two states and keeps traffic off the Dam. Before the ridge was constructed all traffic had to cross between those two states over Hoover Dam.

Make Hoover Dam a destination of one of your future trips; you will not be disappointed.

Thanks for reading! ~Carlton