Latest news with #Reclamation
The Hindu
25-05-2025
- The Hindu
Abandoned quarry sites, wells, water bodies to be fenced to prevent another tragic accident
MADURAI The recent accident at Sathankulam in Thoothukudi district where a car plunged into a roadside well leading to the death of five people, including a toddler, has raised concerns about the safety of taluk and panchayat roads. The accident led to Tamil Nadu Chief Secretary N. Muruganandam directing Collectors and Highway Department officials to conduct immediate inspections of roadside wells and hazardous road stretches across the State. The direction to identify open wells, potholes, and other potentially dangerous areas along roads, according to road users, has come at a time when voices for fencing unused quarries in Madurai district too have been raising. While Madurai district is covered by quarries, several of them have been abandoned long ago due to irregularities flagged by officials, or after expiry of licences. One particular abandoned stone quarry on either side of the road leading to Masthanpatti from Vandiyur ring road junction in Madurai is to be fenced immediately to avoid any untoward incident. While some of the places have elevated boundaries, the abandoned quarry sites along the roads at Masthanpatti situated en route Sakkimangalam lies on the road level without any protective boundaries. The quarries which are about 30 feet deep from the road surface would be sufficient to create massive damage to the vehicle if any accidents are to happen in the future. K. Manimohan, a former quarry worker residing nearby the quarry sites, says though no major accidents have taken place at the location, other than one or two minor accidents, the quarries ought to be fenced before any such accident takes place. The road, which is used by thousands of people from more than 20 villages to reach ring road every day for their jobs, could end up dangerous anytime as the road is less than around 15 feet wide. At night, the stretch of road would be even more dangerous due to lack of streetlights and unfenced deep trenches, he adds. As per Rule 32 of the Granite Conservation and Development Rules 1999, every lease holder shall undertake in a phased manner restoration, reclamation and rehabilitation of lands affected by prospecting of mining operations and shall complete the work before the conclusion of such operations and the abandonment of the granite quarry. Also, as per the Tamil Nadu Minor Mineral Concession Rules, 1959, the District Collector has an important role to constitute a committee under their chairmanship called as the Reclamation, Restoration and Rehabilitation Committee comprising District Collector (Chairperson), Assistant Director of Geology and Mining (Secretary), District Forest Officer, Executive Engineer, (Water Resources Department), District Environment Engineer, Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board), Chief Executive Officer, District Disaster Management Authority) and the District Fire Officer. But, as a known fact, most of the quarry sites in and around the district remain unfenced, unused and dangerous to the public. M. Janaki, a villager, says they are vigilant while passing through the road. 'We are cautious while allowing our children to drive through the road as we never know what might happen if they even slip a bit on either side of the road.' According to a revenue official, the place has remained unfenced for several years. 'We do not have plans to fence, but we will convey the issue to higher officials for action,' the official says. Similarly, in an area called Panaikulam near Thiruvathavur in Melur block in the district, a vast area nearby the road which appears to be a pastureland on just a glance is a water body covered with water hyacinth and other plants. 'While the morning light could somewhat differentiate the road and the water body, night rides are tricky as even a slip from the road edge could put them in a nightmare,' says regular commuters. Especially, when heavy vehicles tried to leave way for other vehicles they could very easily slip from the edge, they added. In Thoothukudi district, where the tragic accident claimed five lives, several such unfenced open private wells can be seen while travelling through any highway or village roads. In Thoothukudi taluk alone, about nine wells have been identified to be dangerous and left unfenced near important roads. Residents of Kumaragiri village, where a private well is located nearby Thoothukudi-Tirunelveli National Highway, say such wells are common in the region surrounding the district. 'Most of them are privately owned and used for agricultural purposes and even for drinking water purposes.' Asked why they have been left unfenced, they says the wells were initially near the agricultural land or their houses were far away from the road, but as the roads were expanded to build highways, the roads came closer to the wells. 'Since no one asked us, or we did not feel the need to fence it, we have left it open. Only the recent incident has caught the eyes of officials about the unsafe wells located along important roads,' they add. Officials say Thoothukudi Collector K. Elambahavath has directed revenue officials to identify such open wells in their taluks and fence it, or create bunds to differentiate them from the adjacent roads. Another similar well on Dindigul – Natham National Highway near Ponagaram, which too looks dangerous, has no warning boards or warning signs to inform commuters about its location. Not just the vehicles but also pedestrians, who use the platform near the well could misplace their steps into the well anytime. As the wells usually would not be full to the brim and appears to be covered with grass due to growth of water plants, the danger of mistaking it for barren land is high, say nearby residents. However, the residents are hopeful that the unused or under use wells would be covered by a fence or closed using iron grills after the State government has passed an order to inspect such precarious wells. Though it cannot be permanently sealed, at least fencing it would prevent accidents caused by open wells and water bodies.
CBC
25-05-2025
- General
- CBC
'Keep thinking about the goal': 87-year-old U of Sask. grad hopes to help revitalize Cree language
Social Sharing When Louise Fraser walked across the stage on Saturday afternoon at Saskatoon's Prairieland Park, she felt happy to achieve a goal she worked so hard for. She wasn't just receiving a degree, she said — she was reclaiming something that was almost taken from her as a child. "When I was a child, I was fluent in the Cree language, because I heard it all the time at home from my family. But when I went to residential school, I was not able to use my language anymore," Fraser said. At 87 years old, Fraser is the oldest graduate in the history of the University of Saskatchewan's Indian Teacher Education Program, a four-year education program designed for First Nations students who want to get a bachelor of education degree. On Saturday, she received her degree, along with 38 others in front of family, friends and supporters. Fraser's Cree name, wîhkaskwa iskwéw, means "Sweetgrass Woman." She's a member of Mistawasis Nêhiyawak, west of Prince Albert, and was taken from her family and sent to residential school in Manitoba when she was eight years old. "Being at residential school, losing my identity, my language and my culture — we had to leave it behind," she said. "We couldn't follow our culture anymore." Being forced to abandon her culture planted the seeds for a lifetime of learning and reclamation. She raised four children and got diplomas and a master's degree, and worked in different fields, from libraries to mental health. But there was more Fraser wanted to do. She applied to the University of Saskatchewan teacher education program in 2023, following in the footsteps of her granddaughter, who graduated from the same program in 2018. Although she initially felt out of place surrounded by new technology and younger classmates, she soon found strength and community, she said. The program is centred around Indigenous culture, language and teacher training — something Fraser said is essential for empowerment of the younger generations. "I heard about many people not speaking our languages anymore. Parents aren't speaking the language to their children. I thought going back to school would be a way of getting it back," Fraser said. When asked what advice she would give to someone who thinks it's too late to go back to school, Fraser didn't hesitate. "Figure out what you want to do, make plans to make it happen…. Just keep thinking about the goal," she said. As for what's next, Fraser says she plans to spend her time teaching Cree and sharing her story in schools and communities.
Yahoo
16-05-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
Speedboat re-emerges at Lake Mead, a reminder summer's dropping water levels
LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — Like a ghost of summers gone by, a speedboat sticking out of the bottom of Lake Mead is back to remind Las Vegas of what could be next for our water supply. Protruding about 8 feet above the lake's surface, the boat still has about 14 feet to show. We last saw it in all its glory in August 2022, rising from the lakebed and earning names like 'Lake Mead monolith' and 'the vertical speedboat.' It became a landmark, or watermark, if you will. Now, it's not in the public eye much. The National Park Service closed Government Wash to vehicle traffic last summer after campers turned into long-term residents and trash started to build up. Photos taken by boaters pop up occasionally on social media. A report released today shows water levels will continue to drop at Lake Mead through the end of July, but only about 6 feet below where they are now. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation's 24-month study shows the lake surface at 1,053.62 feet above sea level by the end of July before rebounding through February 2026, rising 8 feet to 1,061.30 feet. The lake is at 1,059.56 feet as of noon Thursday. Even if Lake Mead won't drop to its 2021 and 2022 levels this year, the news isn't uplifting. Reclamation's projections today seem to defy reports that streamflow into Lake Powell is expected to be about 55% of average, even though snowpack levels reached a peak of 91% on April 8. But looking further into the future, Lake Mead is expected to keep going lower in 2026. Some of the lowest levels that show up in the projections: 1,047.80 — July 2026 1,046.87 — November 2026 1,048.40 — December 2026 1,047.40 — April 2027 Those figures, and particularly the December number, could have serious implications. In August, the Bureau of Reclamation uses Lake Mead's level to set water shortage restrictions that apply to Nevada, Arizona and California. Currently, we're under Tier 1 water restrictions. If Lake Mead is projected to be below 1,050 feet when Reclamation reports in August, states would lose some of their water allocations. 'We're not talking about dead pool this year,' John Berggren of Western Resource Advocates said earlier this week. Dead pool is at 895 feet, when water behind the dam drops lower than pipes used to let water out to flow downstream. When we spoke with Berggren about a month ago, streamflow projections showed Lake Powell inflow at 67%, but it had dropped from 74% projected just two weeks earlier. Now, that number is 55%. For Berggren, the statistics are most concerning because the federal government needs a plan when the current Colorado River guidelines expire. If a new plan isn't in place, rules will revert to a century-old document called the Colorado River Compact — commonly called 'The Law of the River.' What we need, he said, is a plan that is robust enough to account for the reality of a Colorado River that simply has less water than it did when those rules were written 100 years ago. Even the most recent guidelines adopted in 2007 were woefully inadequate to deal with drought conditions that began in 2000 and don't appear to be ending anytime soon. It's not a temporary problem, Berggren said. It demands a long-term fix. About 90% of the water used in Southern Nevada comes from Lake Mead, sucked out through an intake at the bottom of the lake. The majority of the water that comes down the river into Lake Mead belongs to California, which has senior water rights under the Law of the River. On July 27, 2022 — only about three years ago — Lake Mead reached its lowest point since it was filled in the 1930s, dropping to 1,041.71 feet. A wet winter in 2023 helped refill lakes Mead and Powell, the biggest and second-biggest reservoirs in the U.S., after they had dropped to about a fourth of their capacity. Now, Lake Mead is 32% full and Lake Powell is 33% full. The speedboat has been almost like a gauge that tells everyone if the lake is rising or falling. It's a little easier to read than the 'bathtub ring' at Lake Mead that is now somewhere near 170 feet tall. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
New York Times
06-04-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
Review: Reclaiming the Past in a Dance of Simmering Power
In this charged and challenging world, Reggie Wilson, a choreographer one can depend on for dance artistry no matter the political climate, can get to the essence of feeling — the good, the bad and everything in between. His new 'The Reclamation,' performed at NYU Skirball over the weekend, is a powerfully solemn dance that, in part, repurposes material from his early works. That gestural vocabulary, over the course of an hour, becomes a rich blueprint illuminating how the past can meet the present on unaffected terms. Much of the dancing in Wilson's 'Reclamation' has a gravity to it. While it does unspool into speedy passages in moments, the effect is more fleeting and frantic — not the kind that transports you to that happy dance place. The work, featuring seven authoritative performers from Wilson's Fist and Heel Performance Group, including the magnetic Paul Hamilton, is intricately formal and something of a slow, methodical burn because of that. At the start, the performers, one by one, take turns standing still at the front of the stage. Eventually, they all make their way to the back where they peel off layers of clothing and fold them with care before placing them in neat piles on the floor. It's ritualistic — as if by shedding a shawl, they are reclaiming their skin. Soon, they are dressed for the stage in Naoko Nagata and Enver Chakartash's body-skimming separates, some adorned with pops of color. There's an early postmodern vibe to both the dance-wear and to Wilson's movement palette, which arranges and rearranges angular arms, backs that hinge over legs and jumps that send dancers spinning and landing on two feet. Even when the dancers shoot off into different directions, letting go of their precise spacing to vault themselves more loosely into space, they find their way back to lines, crossing the stage as a pack or splintering off in pairs. Dancers often mirror one another, but rarely do they touch. Wilson's soundtrack operates like a mixtape of sonic poetry. The blues singer Son House's 'Motherless Children' is followed by the Gladys Knight and the Pips recording of 'I Can See Clearly Now,' which takes on a despondent tone as the dancers move forward with rocking feet that seem to be stuck in mud. At once listless and direct, they stare hard, especially as the lyrics paint a different picture: 'Gone are the dark clouds that had me blind.' For this group, for this world, the days ahead don't seem so sunshiny. Wilson takes advantage of the width of the Skirball stage and spreads his cast — Hamilton is joined by Oluwadamilare (Dare) Ayorinde, Bria Bacon, Rochelle Jamila, Annie Wang, Henry Winslow and Miles Yeung — across its landscape expanse with duets that appear like visions. The vocabulary is reshuffled throughout, building, at times, to a more heated state as dancers circle the stage with long, loping runs and arms that stroke through the air as if it were water. The song 'Helping,' performed by Tom Smothers, adds to the sense of turbulence with its lyrics, 'Some kind of help is the kind of help we all can do without.' Wilson, who finds ways to create grandness and scale with just seven bodies, ends his dance with the soulful 'Touch a Hand, Make a Friend' by the Staple Singers. Its hypnotic chant, a hope for unity, turns into an order, delivered with a tinge of desperation in this recording, which has two words on repeat: 'Touch somebody! Touch somebody! Touch somebody!' The dancers skim the stage faster and faster, their feet puncturing the floor with sharp stomps and flickering footwork as their hands clap and slap their thighs. Eventually they each fall to the floor arranged in a semicircle and roll in slow motion, forming a large circle that becomes smaller and tighter. It's stark and searing — again, a slow burn — and a testament to Wilson's unspoken message: You can't ignore the past, but you can reclaim it.
CNN
30-03-2025
- Business
- CNN
Why Trump is already worrying the people in charge of the Colorado River
President Donald Trump's first month in office has worried federal and state officials alike tasked with overseeing the West's all-important water supply. The Bureau of Reclamation — the federal agency tasked with managing America's largest dams, including Hoover and Glen Canyon on the Colorado River — is facing as much as a 40% staff cut, although the final number could be lower, three people familiar with the matter told CNN. And the agency still doesn't have a nominee for the commissioner to lead it. Trump's early actions, from staff cuts to directly ordering the US Army Corps of Engineers to open two California dams, have led to concerns over the stability of water management in the region. The administration's pause on federal grants for water cuts, which have since been reinstated, threw a wrench into negotiations between seven Western states on how to divvy up a dwindling and overused Colorado River – negotiations managed by Reclamation with critical deadlines approaching. Internal discussions at Reclamation are now focused on how to protect critical staff who oversee dam safety and hydropower, but agency morale is extremely low, two of the sources said. There is fear that a combination of so-called staff 'buyouts' and the firing of probationary employees has already created a 'skeleton crew' that could be further winnowed, one person familiar with the discussions told CNN. Work-related purchases in the Interior Department's bureaus, including Reclamation, have also been limited to $1, which complicates necessary purchases like oil for dam equipment. An Interior Department spokesperson said Thursday department officials are working to ensure 'purchases in support of mission-critical activities continue in a timely manner.' It's an example of a blanket cut made across the federal government without consideration for agencies' needs. 'It's a lean agency; it's a very effective agency,' said David Hayes, a former high-ranking Interior Department official under President Barack Obama and White House adviser under President Joe Biden. 'It's the largest wholesaler of water in the world; it's managing irrigation districts all around the country. It's not like Washington bureaucracy.' Reclamation's senior officials have already faced pressure from the White House. In the first weeks of Trump's second term, representatives from the Department of Government Efficiency repeatedly demanded the acting head of Reclamation open a major California pump system in late January to release a huge amount of water toward Los Angeles — even though it would have never reached the fire-scarred metropolis, CNN recently reported. The two DOGE agents even flew to California with the goal of turning the pumps on themselves, in what people familiar with the incident characterized as a stunt for a 'photo op.' Days after that unsuccessful DOGE trip, the White House ordered the US Army Corps to release water from the Terminus Dam at Lake Kaweah and Schafer Dam at Lake Success. Ultimately, 2.2 billion gallons flowed out of the two dams into a dry California lakebed before panicked local water managers and Republican and Democratic California lawmakers beseeched the Army Corps to shut it down. 'I think people noticed it and had a twinge of concern that action was being taken without appreciating the interconnectedness of the system,' said Sarah Porter, director of the Kyl Center for Water Policy at Arizona State University. 'The California system is part of a larger 7-state system and it's best to really understand the linkages before an order to spill water.' There are fears it could happen again, especially if more federal workers are cut out of various water agencies, two sources familiar with the agency told CNN. And earlier this month, one of the DOGE representatives who took part in the California trip, Tyler Hassen, was promoted to Interior's assistant secretary for policy, management and budget, according to an order from Interior Sec. Doug Burgum. It's a high-ranking position that gives Hassen power to oversee the budget for Interior and its various bureaus. An Interior Department spokesperson declined to comment on personnel matters. The Trump administration's pause on grants in January and early February was seen in Lake Mead: Water levels dropped after one Native tribe's funding for water conservation dried up. During Trump's first few weeks in office, the Arizona-based Gila River Indian Community found its funding had been turned off and spent weeks trying to get the Interior Department to pay out money they were contractually owed for a water-saving project. Unsure of the future of the conservation agreement, the tribe pulled 3.2 billion gallons of its water out of Lake Mead to put back into its own underground storage system. Mead water levels plummeted, raising alarm bells among Republican and Democratic lawmakers in Arizona, who lobbied Interior to restore federal funding. Gila River's funding was reinstated, but the freeze itself 'was particularly disturbing to us,' Gila River Gov. Stephen Lewis said in a statement to CNN, adding the length of the funding freeze nearly caused 'a rupture in our federal partnership that could have had devastating implications for the entire (Colorado River) Basin.' The Colorado River water negotiations are complex and take finesse and a willingness to listen carefully, said Hayes, the former Interior official. Continuing to compensate stakeholders for their water cuts will be an important part of continued negotiations, he added. 'It's not a fish vs. people issue,' he said, referring to Trump's early executive orders on water. 'That grandstanding about, 'I'm going to solve this water problem' just like this is a recipe for disaster on the Colorado River.' A 2026 deadline is looming for the seven states – Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, New Mexico, California, Arizona and Nevada – to renegotiate how much each can draw from the river. The federal government has played an important role guiding state negotiations and setting deadlines. The new staff cuts could pose logistical challenges to those negotiations, as Reclamation is responsible for monthly reports on water levels at the government's biggest reservoirs. Those reports in 2021 and 2022 showed water levels at Mead and Powell dropping precipitously amid a megadrought and helped lead to a hasty deal among the states to cut back on water usage. Reclamation is 'not only the manager of the Colorado system, but they're functionally the technical experts for the seven states and water users as we try to figure out what the new management guidelines should look like,' said Porter, the Arizona water expert. But western water users see new Interior Sec. Burgum as someone who 'brings an understanding of western natural resources and roll up his sleeves,' Porter noted. Given the looming cuts at Reclamation and chaos with grant funding, states and water users have been seeking a meeting with Burgum, two people familiar with the effort said. 'It would be good to have clarity on what their plan is,' one source said.
