Upstate SC drought worsens: Lake Hartwell could reach record low today

[DemoTex]

Corps says some hazards will go unmarked

CLEMSON -- Lake Hartwell could reach a record low today or Wednesday, and is dropping so fast the Army Corps of Engineers can’t keep up with marking newly exposed hazards.

The corps announced Monday that only hazards within navigational channels in most used areas of the lake will be marked as the drought continues to shrink the body of water. (Snip ..)

At 642.59 feet above mean sea level Monday, Hartwell was 17.4 feet below full pool. The lake has dropped nearly two feet since Oct.1, when it was at 644.27 feet. On Monday, Hartwell hovered about two inches above its historic low of 642.4 feet recorded on Dec. 24, 1981. (Snip ..)

Boaters are urged to use extreme caution while on the lake. As lake levels continue to decline, unknown hazards such as submerged rocks, tree stumps and shoals just below the lake surface may appear within and outside of marked navigational channels. (More ..)


Lake Hartwell near Clemson last winter

http://www.greenvilleonline.com/article/20081021/CUSTOMPUBS04/310210004&referrer=FRONTPAGECAROUSEL

I was at Devil's Fork State Park at Lake Jocassee last week
and was horrified at the lake level.

CONSERVATISM is the driving political philosophy in these parts, but CONSERVATION is barely in the lexicon. Notice that the words "conserve" and "conservation" do not appear at all in this article.

[ensho]

1. wow. are local govts planning for the worst? are local people making

their own plans?

[DemoTex]

2. The silence from officialdom is deafening.

Right now, if you want plans around here you are on your own. Even as our big NW South Carolina lakes dry up, wealthy land developers like The Cliffs have petitioned to dump sewage into the Saluda watershed.

Organizations like Save Our Saluda (SOS) are fighting the developers, and in some cases winning. SOS recently prevailed when Cliff's development The Cliffs at Mountain Park withdrew their application to discharge wastewater into the North Saluda River.

There are other great environmental organizations, like SOS, at work on the water problem. I think we are starting to feel some traction (as opposed to wheel-spinning). I had a neighbor who is a bigwig with The Cliffs get in my face at a restaurant a few weeks ago. He does not like my environmental activism and with a tongue loosened by beverage alcohol he let me know that fact.

http://www.saveoursaluda.org/

[ensho]

4. good grief! dump sewage into the Saluda watershed

the land developers probably don't even know what a watershed is. they see life through a dollar sign.

hope sanity reigns and the sewage goes someplace proper.

[blindpig]

3. Bad and getting worse

The cumulative effect of these recurrent droughts is a reduction of the diversity and density of our flora and fauna. It's really bad in s Spartanburg Co, well away from the rain shadow of the mountains. Our well almost dried up in 2002, if that happens don't know what we'll do. Only the economic slowdown has slowed the relentless spread of sprawl to this area because the county council is totally owned by the real estate bund.

The madness of continual growth will destroy everything.

[DemoTex]

5. The Blue Ridge Escarpment is in dire peril.

The greatest plant extinction in 18,000 years (since the end of the last ice age) proceeds at a frightening rate along the Blue Ridge Escarpment. Many mountain animal populations, some of which were just recovering from the clear-cut timbering practices of the Robber Barons (and their bounty hunters) in the early 1900s, are threatened.

I hike all over the SC Upstate and the NC mountains, and I know of no more beautiful place on earth. The magnificent French Broad River is said to be the oldest river in the world. It is all in danger.

Climate change is certainly one part of the problem. But locally, unchecked development is a more acute and immediate problem.

The very people who have benefited from the Bu$h tax cuts are driving the development in the Upstate. The demand for high-end homes in a gated golf-course community within the mountain environment seems insatiable. I have friends who are tradesmen who find most of their work in these gated communities .. usually a Cliffs development. These are multi-million dollar second (or third, or n .. n+1) homes on choice lots, that often do not get used more than a couple of times a year. Many are corporate-owned to avoid taxes.

They are destroying the Escarpment in order to chase a small white ball across a field while wearing jackass pants and puffing Monte Christo cigars. We are locked out.

And they want to pump their shit into our rivers.

[blindpig]

6. Cliffs

Glassy Mountain used to have a fine population of Timber Rattlesnakes, gone, gone, gone. Now it's got rich parasites.

A pox on those bastards.

What they are doing to the mountains is what they've already done to our formerly exquisite coast.

Heartbreaking.

Golf and real estate developers, two things I would see done away with.

[DemoTex]

7. Ah .. the coast. Don't get me started.

At least there is a great equalizer on the coast: The Hurricane.

[DemoTex]

8. This is one of the biggest environmental stories in the nation, yet ..

.. it sinks like a stone in all the hype and trivia of DU. I'm partly guilty in following the shiney bouncy balls in DU GD, too. But this is about allowing an insult on the land. We have suffered eight years of insult on the people, but we people are nothing without sustainable water and land. Know what I mean?