Long Wait Likely for Final Protection Plans of Kaleshwaram Barrages

 Hyderabad: The final plans for protecting the three Kaleshwaram barrages at Sundilla, Annaram, and Medigadda might not get ready any time soon, given the complexity of the problems being faced at the barrages with respect to completing the required studies.

A meeting on Friday between irrigation department officials, and representatives from the National Dam Safety Authority (NDSA), the Central Water and Power Research Station (CWPRS), Pune, and the Central Soil and Materials Research Station (CSMRS), Delhi, is learnt to have come to an understanding that unless the challenges related to drawing core samples from under the foundations of the barrages are addressed, any final report would not be possible.

Officials were hoping that the NDSA, CWPRS, and CSMRS would be able to provide definitive inputs and information on what was going on under the foundations of the barrages, and suggest the way forward. With issues surrounding the core samples, it was concluded that final reports would not be possible as a proper study of the river bed cannot be made with the available information.

However, in what appears to be a situation of making the best out of a bad situation, the CWPRS and the CSMRS were urged to give reports in the interim based on the results from the various geotechnical and geophysical tests done so far at the barrages.

Fresh studies are now not possible till the end of the monsoon season and until the floods in Godavari subside and the river bed is dry which will happen only next summer. It may be recalled it was reported in these columns on June 28 that engineers engaged at the barrages were struggling to extract usable core samples.

Sources said the drilling for core samples on the upstream and downstream sides of the barrages before the current rainy season resulted in increased flows, and faced the challenge of material collapse on account of water deep in the river bed. The question discussed was how to overcome this problem, as well as study of the health of the piles under the foundations, as well as reinforcement of the raft foundation, sources said.