Abstract
California law requires all dams, meeting a certain hazard criterion, to have Emergency Action Plans (EAP) and inundation maps. The focus of this project was to create an inundation map of the Bidwell Lake Dam located in the Northern California County of Plumas. The inundation map was created by simulating the breach of the Bidwell Lake Dam using a 2D hydraulic modeling software known as the Hydrologic Engineering Center’s River Analysis System (HEC-RAS). The model simulates the release of 5,975 acre-feet of water through a dam breach formed in 0.1 hours. The model parameters needed for the simulation include, a Digital Elevation Model (DEM), land cover classification, and a dam breach hydrograph. The simulation results indicate that the nearby populated places of Greenville and Crescent Mills would be affected by the flood, as well as parts of the surrounding Indian Valley. Flood water would take approximately nine minutes to reach Greenville and three hours to reach Crescent Mills. Some building structures in Greenville would experience flood depths of fifteen feet and velocities of fifteen feet per second. HEC-RAS results for inundation area, depth and velocity were similar to results from an alternative tool, DSS-WISE Lite.