4 ms·

I'm not sure if your point is applicable here. This is a dam from 1986, not some new fangled contraption no one understands. It has a known maintenance schedule

I'm not sure if your point is applicable here. This is a dam from 1986, not some new fangled contraption no one understands. It has a known maintenance schedule and is old school technology. The problem is, ISIS decided to murder or chase off the staff who maintains the dam and didn't keep up with the work it needs. Worse, the construction was done "on the cheap" as dictated by the Hussein regime. Instead of digging deeply into the delicate and soluble gypsum and grouting properly, the engineers were forced to use a shallow blanket-grout technique which simply requires more maintenance going forward as it failed to stop dissolution. Grouting on this dam is done six days a week. That's right, every day but Sunday since 1986. ISIS's pause of this created this crisis. Contrary to your point, if it was done "first world style" it would be a much more stable dam, but instead the Hussein regime was too busy buying palaces and gold toilets to care too much about getting large scale projects right. Iraqis now much pay forward the technical debt of the shallow blanket grout until the dam is decommissioned. There is no alternative here and this dam should be a study of autocratic regime's attempts at cost savings which ultimately cost more in the long run and may eventually cause a human rights disaster. I believe 1m people are at risk of drowning if this dam collapses. These are non-trivial numbers.

huxley 10y ago
Iraq had a lot of money back then and like in much of the developing world, mega-projects were sought after (and not just by despots). The Mosul Dam was not built cheaply, it was rushed to completion to meet some idiotic deadline. The other options would likely not have cost much more (especially considering maintenance), but it would have taken more time. And it was "first-world style", the consultants and construction firms were European just like the ones that built Kariba Dam. They had no problem building it nor any problem cashing the cheques.
- woodandsteel 10y ago
  The article says the dam was rushed because of the war with Iran that Saddam Hussein started in 1979. Saddam had the crazy idea that he could conquer the Middle East and make Iraq into a world superpower. So he started a war with much larger Iran, the war stalemated and went on for 8 years, with enormous loss in human lives, and enormous debts piled up on the Iraqi side. That ended and Saddam invaded Kuwait to get its oil riches, leading to the Gulf War which Iraq quickly lost. Saddam still wanted to build an empire, so he prevented full nuclear arms inspections to keep the rest of the Middle East afraid he still had a nuclear arms program, and in fact planned to re-start it after the inspection and sanctions program ended. That lead to the Iraqi war, which Iraq quickly lost, and left Iraq so divided and disorganized that ISIS could arise and take much of the country, including temporarily taking the Mosul Dam. And the disorganized, corrupt government has bungled dealing with the threat of the dam collapsing, and so we are in the present, very dangerous situation. So it all goes back to Saddam Hussein, and the generally poor political situation in Iraq, and beyond that, I would say, the Middle East as a whole.

huxley 10y ago

Iraq had a lot of money back then and like in much of the developing world, mega-projects were sought after (and not just by despots). The Mosul Dam was not built cheaply, it was rushed to completion to meet some idiotic deadline. The other options would likely not have cost much more (especially considering maintenance), but it would have taken more time. And it was "first-world style", the consultants and construction firms were European just like the ones that built Kariba Dam. They had no problem building it nor any problem cashing the cheques.

woodandsteel 10y ago
The article says the dam was rushed because of the war with Iran that Saddam Hussein started in 1979. Saddam had the crazy idea that he could conquer the Middle East and make Iraq into a world superpower. So he started a war with much larger Iran, the war stalemated and went on for 8 years, with enormous loss in human lives, and enormous debts piled up on the Iraqi side. That ended and Saddam invaded Kuwait to get its oil riches, leading to the Gulf War which Iraq quickly lost. Saddam still wanted to build an empire, so he prevented full nuclear arms inspections to keep the rest of the Middle East afraid he still had a nuclear arms program, and in fact planned to re-start it after the inspection and sanctions program ended. That lead to the Iraqi war, which Iraq quickly lost, and left Iraq so divided and disorganized that ISIS could arise and take much of the country, including temporarily taking the Mosul Dam. And the disorganized, corrupt government has bungled dealing with the threat of the dam collapsing, and so we are in the present, very dangerous situation. So it all goes back to Saddam Hussein, and the generally poor political situation in Iraq, and beyond that, I would say, the Middle East as a whole.