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Show Stored Water In Lake Mead Breaks Record Breaking all records, the stored I water in Lake Mead forming behind Boulder Dam reached a total of 8,-000,000 8,-000,000 acre-feet to-day, while the total stored in other Federal reclamation rec-lamation reservoirs was 9,212,258 acre-feet. Not only is Lake Mead now the greatest 'body of water ever trapped by man in the history of the world but the other Federal reclamation rec-lamation storage basins throughout the West today hold more water than ever before. Boulder Dam now holds nearly as much water as all other projects together. Lake Mead continued its rapid growth as the Colorado River remained re-mained at high stage and Boulder Dam released only enough to supply sup-ply irrigation needs below. It reached a depth of 360 feet at Boulder Dam. Its length increased only a short distance over the 91 miles recorded record-ed 11 days ago when 7,000,000 acre-foot acre-foot mark was passed. The reason for this is that the head of Lake Mead now is at the notorious Hell-diver Hell-diver Rapids. It will take a consid- erable increase in volume w ou-literate ou-literate this steep cascade,twhich so far has been impassible to those traveling upstream. "With the irrigation season now under way," John C. Page, acting reclamation commissioner, said in reporting to Secretary of the Interior Inter-ior Harold L. Ickes, "conditions are generally favorable for Federal reclamation rec-lamation projects. There are two projects which may have to prorate their stored water for a time before the close of the season, but otherwise other-wise the supply for all 40 projects is ample -and a great majority of them will have substantial carryover carry-over supplies which will remain unused un-used this winter." The total storage for these projects, proj-ects, which today have a protective reserve of 9,212,258 acre-feet, was 7,730,289 acre-feet May 1, 1935 and 5,901,734 acre-feet May 1, 1934. Subnormal Sub-normal precipitation since 1929, climaxed cli-maxed by the severe drought of 1934, had reduced reserve supplies in all reservoirs. However, at no time during this long dry period has a Federal reclamation project suffered a critical deficiency in its water supply. "Now that our reservoirs again are well filled by a winter that was normally productive of water in virtually vir-tually all western areas," Page said, "the danger of ever sustaining a major ma-jor drought on one of our Federal projects is indeed remote. We have weathered a most trying period ol years for the irrigator without loss." Ralph Lowry, construction engineer en-gineer in charge at Boulder Dam, reported that installation of the first generators in the power house is about 80 percent complete, with the number two unit in the Nevada wing of the power house farthest advanced. This unit, comprised of a 115,000 horsepower turbine and a generator of 82,500 kilovolt ampere probably will be ready for testing in August. |