El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1911-08-26
Progress On Elephant Butte Dam,
Great 100000 Irrigation Project
Vast Amount Of Work Has Been Done Largely Prepare
tory To the Opening Of the Big Excavation.

yon at the damsite. The foundation for
the towers on the east side of the river
is nearly completed. On the west side
the part to be excavated for the foun-
dalton for the towers has been COM
pleted, but the part to be filled has
not yet been finished The rock being
taken out from the spillway close by
is being used in making this fill. There
will be three towers on either side Of
the river, the ones on the west side will
be 120 feet high, while those on the
east side will be only so feet. These
will be used to support specially fabri-
Gated cables upon which travellers will
run for transporting the stone and
concrete to the places desired during
the construction of the DAM The span
Of these cables is 1920 feet.
First, the Great FIume.
The main unit for construction for
1911 is the f1ume or bypass for the
river while the dam is being built to a
small height above the river bed This
flume is to be built upon shelf of
rock, blasted out of the hillside 1t will
therefore have a firm foundation and
will not be easily washed away by any
floods which might overflow its east
side. This flume will be so feet wide,
IA feet high and will carry 10000 GU
bic feet per second or nearly twice as
the Rio Grande during the past year.
The flume will be 100 feet long and
will require the excavation of $4,000
cubic yards The floor of the flume will
be lined with one foot of concrete into
which will be imbedded upright posts
and their braces. Three inch planks
will be nailed on these posts for sid
ing. The hillside will serve as the up
per side of the flume.
Degree of Progress.
On August "a, 40 percent of the exca-
walton was completed. About 500 cubic
yards are excavated daily, two shifts
working The work at night is lighted
by acetylene lights with powerful sill
yer reflectors. About half of the 500
hundred men employed here are at
work on the flume. The excavated ma
terial is first blasted. then loaded into
skips by hand or handled in big pieces
with steel dogs, lifted by derricks.
loaded into dump cars and hauled
about one-fourth mile to the dumping
ground by means of donkey engines.
There are now five derricks in opera
ton upon the f1ume work.
The Big Dam.
No work has as yet been done on
the excavation for the foundation for
the dam. The flume must be COM
pleted and copper dams built before
work. on the dam proper can begin. The
dam is TO be 1876 feet wide on the bot
tom. Bed rock is IS feet below the
present surface of the river The ele
Walton of the roadways across the dam
will be 200 feet above the present riv-
er bed This road will be IA feet wide
and have parapet walls on both sides,
the side facing the reservoir will be
solid to prevent waves from breaking
through While the one on the lower
side will contain openings to allow any
water that may occur from rains or
excessive waves to escape. The total
length of the dam along the roadway
will be 1900 feet
The dam will be faced on both sides
with huge concrete blocks. The in
terror will be of concrete cyclopean
sandstone. The latter will be obtained
from quarries to be opened in Ash
canyon, along the branch railroad.
1t seems impossible TO get any es-
innate of the time required to COM
plete the dam. Some of the officials
when approached unofficially and when
everything is apparently running
smoothly say that it may be possible
to complete the dam in four or five
years from the present time. But 9TH
ers who are better acquainted with the
Rio Grande generally seem to be cal
upon six or seven years being
necessary for the completion of this
work. To those who, have studied this
it can easily be seen that
no good estimate of the time reQui1ed
TO complete this mammoth structure
can be made a s so many unforeseen and
complicated conditions are sure to oc-
cur, which cannot be foretold at the
present time. On a small piece of work
those conditions are limited, but on
a great piece Of work, like the Ele-
plant Butte dam, they are more nu-
merous and have greater influence.
District engineer W. NJ. Reed, a couple
Of months ago gave out the statement
that but little water will be stored I'M
til the completion of the dam.
Disbursing $4,000 a Day.
Within the past year the camp at
Elephant Butte has grown from a
dozen population to about 400 peo-
pie and it is said that it Is the metropo-
lis of Sierra county About 900 men are
and the disbursing officer is
tbout s4000s per day for 4,
wages and materials. The maximum
number of employees has not yet been
reached. The next six months will show
very great progress at Elephant Butte. 4