The Imperial press., 1905-07-15

| ] Sink has been such as to caAse that body
 to rise steadily. This rise has caused l It t. encHoach on the Southern Pacific
 tracks at salton, has put that com pany
 elMously.on tie alert, has given rise
 to lot of sensational neWspaper re-
 ports and set afioat d lot of rumors con fcerli.g the state of affairs at the Colo .radoriver These runors while unsub-
 stantiated and vaeue, have been sutfi-
 ciently disquieting to cause our people -sonIe discomfort We have endeavored
 to sift them out as far as possible, and 1 from what we can learn the following
 appears to be the situation:
 The Colorado river has fallen to about
 22 foot stage and an average flow of
 about 10000 cubic feet per second.
 During the past month the dover Mex
 jean intake has washed very badly, | being, at last reports July s, about 300 i feet wide and l5 feet deep. The volume
 of water diverted by this stream at that
 time was very large, being as much as
 a million CT more miners inches, which
 of itself was a formidable amount of
 water. Tie rapid decline i'll the river
 and the work that is being done by the
 California Development Company, how
 ever has cut off large per cent of this
 water, and the fact that the crest of
 the flood has now been safely passed,
 leads us to believe that we will weather
 the crisis without damage either to tlre i farmers or tp the irrigation canals. l The long continued floods have caused
 the channels of New river and Salton to sluice out much deeper and wider, and they are now able to carry much larger volume of water than formerly. ! The California DevelopmpIIt Go. has two i pile drivers at work at the lower Mexican intake, and are endeavOring to turn
 the current 0f the livfr to the east side 0F tie strla,ll tfik I56ifYt W ffeiits tfle-
 river Is breaking through to this Valley,
 there is a small island in the river, and i formerly the river flowed about equally
 on both sides of 1t. However, since
 the disastrous cutting of the intake set
 in, and the channel to Imperial Valley
 came to be SC much deeper than the l natural grade of the river, the main 1 volume of the water in the river has hugged the west bank and the channel
 t" the east of the island has become silted ups
 It IS the intention of Chief Engineer l Redwood, to put in dam across the
 west channel of the river, the dam ex- tending from the hank, short distance above the Imperial intake, to the island
 Tn the middle of the river. Mir. Rock wood expects to have this dam com l pleted in two weeks time and feels
 certain of his ability to shut out the 1 surplus water by this means When l this is done. tie work of permanently closing this lower Mexican channel will ] be taken up and the construction of the 1 headgates and works which shall con 1 trol the water for the future will be pushed. This very unexpected conduct i on the part of the Colorado river is i putting our Valley to quite severe i test
 ] So far no serious breaks Lave occurred
 in any Of the ditcbes or ievtes since our last report, hut all lbe farmers in the
 Mesquite Lake basin have been warned 
 to remove their cattle and live stock,
 as 1t IS not thought best to risk them on
 the lowands while the Salton river is
 so nigh and i'll such imminent danger
 of breaking over its banks and flooding this lake. Contrary tn all expectations ] the water Ill tie Sal,on Sea has con tinued to rise, aid now 1t is up against
 the grade Of the Southern Pacific rail-
 road for about four miles and Is on both sides of the track for about two miles. The water in this Salton Sea Is rising at the rate of an inch or more every twenty-f"ur hours. It covers all area of | about 600 square miles, and Is at least twenty-five feet deep over the greater 1 part of this area.
 The great body of water rolls up
 against thn roadbtd Ill miniature break
 CTS under the influence of the ,iesert winds .tnI undermine the track SASnit.A