Kentucky Dam

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Kentucky Lock and Dam, impounding Kentucky Lake on the Tennessee River. View is downriver to the northwest. Only about the northern half of the dam is shown.

Kentucky Dam is a dam on the Tennessee River on the dividing line between Livingston County and Marshall County in the U.S. state of Kentucky. It impounds Kentucky Lake, which is 184 miles (296 km) long, and is the largest artificial lake in the eastern United States, at 160,000 acres (650 km²), with a shoreline of 2,380 miles (3830 km). Its 4,008,000 acre feet (4.94 km³) of flood storage capacity are used to reduce flooding on the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. It has saved an estimated $200 million in flood damage to approximately 6 million acres (24,000 km²) of land in the lower Ohio and Mississippi valleys. is one of nine Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) dams on the Tennessee River. It is 22 miles upstream of the confluence of the Tennessee and Ohio Rivers near Paducah, Kentucky. A canal connects Kentucky Lake to nearby Lake Barkley, created by Barkley Dam on the Cumberland River. The lakes run parallel for more than 50 miles (80 km), with the Land Between the Lakes National Recreation Area located between them.

Kentucky Dam is located at 37°00′47″N, 88°16′09″W a few miles upstream of Calvert City.

The impetus for construction of a dam in the area was the devastating 1937 flood of the Ohio River, and the desire for electric generation. The dam was started July 1, 1938 and completed on August 30, 1944. The project cost $118,500,000. The dam is 206 feet (63 m) high, and 8,422 feet (2567 m) long. Three quarters of that length is an earthen levee, and one quarter is concrete.^[1] It is the longest dam on the Tennessee River. Its 5 hydroelectric generating units produce 199 megawatts of electricity. The site of Birmingham, Kentucky, was inundated by impoundment of the lake. Gilbertsville, Kentucky was relocated. A 600 foot (180 m) lock adjacent to the dam was completed in 1945, and is to be supplemented by a new 1200 foot lock which will be better able to accommodate the long barge tows which navigate the river. A large industrial complex of chemical plants developed below the dam near Calvert City, Kentucky, due to the convenient barge transportation and inexpensive TVA electricity.

The dam is near the New Madrid Seismic Zone, which produced earthquakes of estimated magnitude 7.0 to 7.9 in 1811, approximately 60 miles (100 km) northeast of the zone's center. Emergency preparedness officials in Marshall County and McCracken County, Kentucky (downstream from the dam) and a TVA spokesman discussed concerns of the public about the dam in 2005 in a local newspaper. The dam was regarded as well maintained. In the unlikely event of a failure, it would probably be in the earthen levees at the end of the concrete portion of the dam, which would start small and enlarge as water poured through it. It not expected that a fifty foot wall of water would suddenly go down the river. It should take at least six hours for the water level to rise above the Calvert City chemical plants. The floodwater should only reach the base of the Paducah floodwall.^[1]

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^ ^a ^b Bill Bartleman, "Dam safety attracts public concern," The Paducah Sun, Paducah, Ky. distributed by Knight Ridder Tribune Business News. Washington: Sep 28, 2005. pg. 1