Watch Out for Flooding: When the Power System Created a Weather Disaster

Many weather disasters can adversely impact the power system: thunderstorms initiating a blackout of New York City on 13 July 1977, an ice storm severely damaging the transmission system in southern Quebec in 1998, and countless hurricanes and tornadoes that have knocked out service to customers for weeks at a time. The reverse can also happen: the power system is capable of creating a weather disaster. This happened in southeastern Missouri in the early morning of 14 December 2005, when so much water was pumped into the upper reservoir of the Taum Sauk pump storage plant that it overflowed, resulting in a devastating flood that destroyed a house, stranded three motorists, and did significant damage in and around a state park. Luckily, no one was killed, and most of the water ended up in the plant's lower reservoir, which was largely able to contain the flow and prevent further damage downstream.