preface
On the evening of October 9, 1963, the Italian Alps burst into torrential rain, and with a shocking sound like a nuclear bomb explosion, a huge wave with a volume of 50 million cubic meters fell straight from a height of 250 meters, and when it reached the village, the force wave was still 70 meters high, and 2,000 people were shot alive by the huge wave.
Before this, no one had ever seen such a high wave on land, and this was probably the first time in human history that such a bizarre accident occurred.
This article is divided into two parts, the first part introduces the beginning and end of the Vaiang dam accident in Italy, and the second part briefly introduces the failure of the hydropower station in Laos on July 23, 2018.
Next, I will tell you about the beginning and end of these two major dam disasters.
The Vaion Dam catastrophe in Italy
Located in northern Italy, downstream of the Waion River, the largest dam is 262 meters high, much higher than the Three Gorges Dam by 185 meters, and was the world's tallest man-made dam at that time. To this day, excluding unbuilt dams, the Waiang Dam remains the seventh tallest dam in the world.
Vaiang Ba is part of the Adriatic Power Company, whose founder, Giuseppe Di Misrata, was Mossolini's finance minister.
Of course, Giuseppe had been dead for many years when the dam was built, but the project was first proposed by Giuseppe in 1920. Because Giuseppe himself was a well-known entrepreneur and had deep ties to the government, after the end of World War II, the Vaion Dam project fell into the hands of the Adriatic Power Company.
After World War II, the whole of Europe entered a stage of rapid development. Social prosperity, scientific and technological progress, various super projects have sprung up, Italy has also caught up with the European infrastructure frenzy, and unwilling to be reluctant, it will build the world's tallest dam, and the whole project will be completed in a little more than three years.
Italy's speed is jaw-dropping, and on the Vaion Dam, world records are being broken one after another, and it seems that Italians are holding their breath to restore the glory of the Roman Empire.
But in 1959, Montetok on the dam side showed signs of displacement, and at least three geologists warned Adria Power that Mount Monttok was unstable, and that the dam's terrifying height and high water storage could easily cause the surrounding landslides.
However, there is no turning back, the dam is almost built, how can Adria Power respond? So the experts' warnings were completely ignored by the company.
In April-May 1962, when the dam level was raised to 215 meters, five magnitude 5 earthquakes were reported, and the Adriatic power remained unheard of. The dam was then filled to its highest level.
Two months later, Adria Power engineers conducted a landslide experiment based on a 1:200 model, and tests showed that if the water level was less than 20 meters from the bottom of the dam, the waves generated by the landslide would rush through the bottom of the dam, which is a very dangerous phenomenon. All reports are public, there is no concealment, and everyone knows that the Waiang Dam is in danger.
In March 1963, things changed dramatically, and the Adriatic Power Company miraculously nationalized the dam, which means that the dam suddenly became the property of the Italian state, and had nothing to do with the Adriatic Power Company.
It's a godly operation.
There must be incredible reasons behind the incredible operation, but the Italian government does not pursue it, and the melon-eating masses cannot be investigated.
Six months later, on October 9, dam engineers saw many trees fall from the hillside and rocks continued to roll down the dam, estimating that the landslide was irreversible, and people urgently lowered the water level to the safe range given by Adriatic Power.
By 10:39 p.m., about 260 million cubic meters of rocky forest crashed into the reservoir at a speed of 110 kilometers per hour, completely filling the narrow reservoir in just 45 seconds, like suddenly throwing a huge stone into a basin.
50 million cubic meters of water, equivalent to one-third of the entire water stock, was squeezed out of the reservoir from a height of 250 meters and directly smashed into the villages downstream, the super-large shock wave fell from the sky, the loud noise was like an atomic bomb, and the four villages downstream completely turned into yellow mud plains, and 2,000 people died instantly.
When the water receded, there was only a silent silence.
Immediately after the disaster, politicians and public authorities stated that the tragedy was caused by unexpected and irresistible natural events.
Italian politician Giovanni Leon was elected prime minister just four months ago, an incident that indirectly led to his ouster two months later.
Giovanni Leon
After stepping down, Giovanni actually became the chief lawyer of Adriatic Power, which not only successfully reduced the amount of compensation for the victims of Adriatic, but also excluded compensation for at least 600 victims.
Only one Adria Power engineer, Mario Pankini, committed suicide in 1968, and the rest were lenient, and the government did not claim any damages from Adria Power throughout.
A strange natural disaster, the same bizarre handling method, the mysterious means of Adria Power Company, the depth of the background, people are jaw-dropping.
Although many people protested, what can these villagers in the mountains change? Except for the government rebuilding the village on the hillside, the whole incident ended there.
More than 50 years have passed since the Waiang Dam incident, but the horror of the floods should not be forgotten in any way.
Dam failure at Sangnan Nam Hydropower Station in Sangpan, Laos
On July 23, 2018, the sub-dam of the Samam Nam Hydropower Station in Sampan, Laos, failed to witness the images and data recorded by the accident, and we can see the horror of the flood.
The Sangnan Nam Hydropower Station in Laos, built by SK Engineering and Construction of South Korea, has a total capacity of 1.043 billion cubic meters, equivalent to one-half of the water stored in Beijing's Miyun Reservoir in 2018.
SK Group Building
The exact cause of the dam failure has not yet been conclusive, but according to a South Korean spokesman, there was an 11-centimeter subsidence in the middle of the sub-dam, but did not explain why part of the structure subsidence and cracks formed. They especially stressed that all this happened in the exceptional circumstances of heavy rain weather.
Regardless of what the Korean side says, we tried to understand the history of the accident from the live video at that time. Video footage shows trees constantly being washed down around a factory very close to the dam failure, and two cars trying to drive away. There was also a white car blocked by a large tractor in front, it was too late.
The final shot is that all the cars are wrapped in muddy water and can't get out. The people in the car slammed the windows, wailing helplessly. The whole video is a total of 1 minute and 38 seconds, which shows that the water rises faster than imagined.
A second video was also recorded at the scene of the accident, which was shot by local engineers in South Korea.
At first, you can see that the water has poured into the city, the water comes very quickly, it only takes 1 minute to basically flood the cars, and there are vehicles drifting everywhere.
The photographer seemed to be standing on the top of a building, and soon, they felt that their location was not very safe, so they continued to climb to the roof. From the water pouring into the entire street, the waves are rough, and in less than 3 minutes, the city has become a ze country,
The dam failure in Laos killed more than 100 people, affected 13,000 people, and left more than 6,000 homeless, dealing a heavy blow to the overall economy of Laos.
After the Laos dam failure, because the Lao government was fighting a lawsuit with a South Korean company, the follow-up dam repair work was handed over to China Hydropower Infrastructure Bureau Co., Ltd. Now the dam has been repaired and the hydropower plant is operational.
epilogue
The Vaiang Dam disaster and the Laos dam failure are both a combination of natural and man-made disasters. Before disaster, no engineer could have foreseen such an outcome, because the power of nature has always exceeded human understanding of it.
On the surface, the Waiang Dam disaster was due to insufficient geological exploration and poor site selection, but in fact, due to rapid social and economic development, people's hearts have been deceived by greed, and large companies have used financial resources to corrupt the government, and then manipulated the entire society.
In fact, behind those collapsed super projects, not doing things according to science is always just the appearance, and degenerate human nature is the most fundamental reason.