PIERCE – As the Lower Elkhorn Natural Resources District (LENRD) continues to monitor the infrastructure across their 15 counties in northeast Nebraska, historic numbers from the Willow Creek Dam have been addressed.
According to a release from the LENRD, the Willow Creek reservoir holds back 7,100 acre-feet of water on average. As of Friday, March 15, Willow Creek was holding back over 18,000 acre-feet of water.
An acre-foot is a unit of volume commonly used to reference large-scale water resources, such as reservoirs. It is defined as the volume of water necessary to cover one acre of surface area to a depth of one foot.
An acre-foot is equal to 325,851 gallons of water. If you take that number times the 18,000 acre-feet of water that Willow Creek held back during the storm, you get 5.86 billion gallons of water.
In the dam at the Willow Creek State Recreation Area, there are 27 pressure relief wells across the earthen structure. These 27 wells relieve the pressure on the dam and prevent the water from pushing through and eroding a channel under or near the dam.
The Lower Elkhorn Natural Resources District would like to thank all the volunteers who helped and continue to help with water rising and falling as well as those who assisted the LENRD staff as they monitored the Willow Creek Dam.
The Willow Creek State Recreation Area is located in Pierce County just southwest of the City of Pierce. The area is owned by the LENRD and managed by the Nebraska Game & Parks Commission.