River Raging, but Still Open for Business

By Chris Woodka, The Pueblo Chieftain, Colo.

Jun. 3–Snow is melting quickly and swelling the Arkansas River, prompting boating advisories in the most dangerous reaches.

"We haven’t closed anything," said Rob White, manager of the Arkansas River Headwaters Recreation Area. "What’s important is to boat to the skill levels of the operator."

Advisories were issued Sunday for the Numbers, north of Buena Vista, and the Royal Gorge, west of Canon City, as water levels rose to above 3,000 cubic feet per second — double the amount in the river a week earlier.

"For experienced boaters, you can still have an incredible experience," White said. "We haven’t seen these kinds of levels since 1995."

The advisory urges boaters to use appropriate equipment — helmets, dry suits and wet suits — on all sections of the river. Commercial rafters generally switch to less difficult sections of the river in high water, White said. "Instead of rafting the Numbers, they’ll switch to Brown’s Canyon," White said.

The most dangerous thing about narrow canyons is that the velocity of water increases, making handling a boat more difficult.

White said all commercial operators on the Arkansas River work under an agreement with state parks that requires guides to be qualified on all sections of the river. They are also required to be fully insured.

But safety is not guaranteed.

A Kansas man was killed May 25 when a raft overturned at Sledge Hammer Falls, a class 4 rapid in the Royal Gorge. Water levels at the time were only half of what they rose to Monday. In 2007, five people died in rafting accidents on the Arkansas River.

Pueblo is encouraging those who wish to use the Downtown Whitewater Park to have proper training and equipment before getting into the river.

"When someone from state parks, who is knowledgable about the river issues, alerts or notices upstream we try to encourage people to pay attention to those alerts as the Arkansas River comes through Pueblo," said City Manager Dave Galli.

The rapid melt-off is not creating a major flooding threat, said Steve Witte, Water Division 2 engineer.

"We have not had reports of flooding," Witte said. "I drove up to Salida (Monday) morning (from Pueblo), and there was a good strong flow. There were some floating logs and debris in the river."

Fremont County is approaching a minor flood stage, according to the National Weather Service. The Arkansas River is slightly below the 9-foot flood stage. The level is expected to crest at 9.4 feet by Wednesday and would overtop screens at the Canon City water intake and flood low-lying fields, but the river level would be about 4 feet below the level that could damage homes or businesses.

"We have a few thousand sandbags, unfilled," Fremont County Commissioner Mike Stiehl said. "I think we’re OK unless there’s a big rain over the next week, which doesn’t look likely from the forecast."

Stiehl said if there is flooding, the county is most concerned about areas immediately downstream of Canon City and Florence, parks and some basements.

There is still ample room to store all that water in dams above Pueblo.

Anticipating a wet year with heavy runoff, the Bureau of Reclamation drew down Turquoise and Twin Lakes earlier this year. On Monday, Turquoise was less than half full, while Twin Lakes was about two-thirds full, according to Reclamation’s Web site.

The Fryingpan-Arkansas Project, which brings water from the Fryingpan River into the Arkansas River basin through the Boustead Tunnel at Turquoise Lake, should yield more than 100,000 acre-feet — about 32.6 billion gallons — this year, said Roy Vaughan, chief of Reclamation’s Pueblo office. Of that, 83,000 acre-feet have been leased to cities and farmers by the Southeastern Colorado Water Conservancy District, along with 17,000 acre-feet of agricultural return flows.

A rapid runoff can be problematic.

In the last couple of weeks, more than 13,000 acre-feet have moved through the Boustead Tunnel, according to Reclamation estimates. This week, gates were cranked fully open, allowing about 1,800 acre-feet per day to run through.

"I was doing the math on that and getting kind of worried," Vaughan said. "But this is typical for a heavy snowpack. It will just run longer."

Snow surveys by the National Resources Conservation Service show a steep decline in snowpack at measurement sites. The snow is measured by a "snow pillow" that records the weight of the water in the snow. The pillows are few and far between, however. Looking at the Fry-Ark collection area, there is still a heavy snowpack at higher elevations and nights have remained cool enough to prevent it all melting at once, Vaughan said.

Melting at lower elevations is also supporting downstream gauges, which means the Fry-Ark Project does not have to bypass any flows to satisfy West Slope demands, Vaughan said.

Despite the meltdown that accelerated over the weekend, the state snowpack is still relatively robust, at 106 percent of average. The Arkansas River basin was at 123 percent of average on Monday, while the Colorado River basin, from which water is imported, was at 138 percent of average.

Arkansas River water has been flowing faster out of Pueblo Dam than it is flowing in. In March, the dam was nearing full capacity of 256,949 acre-feet (with 93,000 acre-feet of flood cushion). By Monday, it had been drawn down to 225,915 acre-feet, about 88 percent of the usable capacity.

Farmers east of Pueblo have been calling for water stored in accounts in Lake Pueblo because of dry conditions. The U.S. Drought Monitor, compiled by several federal agencies, still shows Eastern Colorado as ranging from abnormally dry to moderate drought.

Precipitation in Pueblo has been light so far this year, about 3 inches as measured by the National Weather Service, about 68 percent of average and less than half of what had fallen by June 1, 2007.

Flows in Fountain Creek, meanwhile, are trickling along at about 30 cfs, only about half of the average flow for this time of year, because of lack of precipitation and increased seasonal water use — landscape watering — in El Paso County and Colorado Springs.

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Copyright (c) 2008, The Pueblo Chieftain, Colo.

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