On-The-Level

A lot of action has been taken to help those who enjoy recreation at Lake Sakakawea get into the water Over the past few years the lake level has been dropping due to the lack of precipitation feeding it Tonight Ryan Davidson tells us in his special report where all that water comes from and how much we need to raise the lake back to it s normal level Ryan - It s been over ten years since Lake Sakakawea has seen a normal water level Drought conditions and lack of snowfall have made boat ramps and shorelines grow Is it possible to get back to a time when the water was deeper Tonight I ll take you on an in-depth look on the level of the lake Lake Sakakawea is 28 feet below it s normal level or what is called it s normal operating pool Over the past decade the lake has dropped a total of 45 feet That s a direct result of the dry conditions we ve been experiencing in North Dakota in the Summer but more importantly in the winter But the majority of the water that feeds lake Sakakawea doesn t come in the form of rain on the prairie Most of the water that fills the lake throughout the year comes from the snow pack in parts of the Northern Rockies in Montana As the seasons warm through summer the snow melts and flows down two main tributaries to The Big Lake The Missouri River through Fort Peck and the Yellowstone River The flow of the Missouri through Fort Peck is a little restricted because of the Fort Peck Dam Interestingly we actually get more water from the Yellowstone Phillip Brown US Army Corps of Engineers Garrison Project yellowstone basin has many irrigation type diversion dams but that for the most part flows through with less restriction The problem is that over the last few years the snowpack and the plains snowcover has not been enough to supplement the loss of water from the lake which is the major reason why the level has been falling This year however the Army Corps of engineers says that the mountain snowpack above Fort Peck is right around one hundred percent That s good news But the issue of dry conditions still poses a problem during the spring thaw Charlene Prindiville Hydrologist soil moisture conditions are very very dry we re still in a drought situation particularly in the western 3rd of North Dakota and that hasn t changed for over a year now It s getting progressively drier as the snow conditions have been minimal for winter we are below normal for most locations Thankfully the season isn t over and we have a really good chance of seeing some more snow through the rest of February some of March and in some cases even in April But even a lot of snow through the end of the winter may not be enough Phil Brown it s going to take a significantly higher percentage of normal snowfall to get this reservoir back to normal operating pool In fact a higher than normal snowfall is an understatement Lake Sakakawea as you know is a BIG lake It has a surface area of about 368 000 acres or 575 square miles The lake itself at it s current level contains 6 trillion gallons of water That s about the same amount of runoff forecast for this season And that should keep the lake level from falling too much further Here s the problem Just to add a little water to the lake would take a lot It would take over 6 billion gallons of water to fill lake sakakwea one inch Which is the same as filling 554 capital towers with water and dumping them in the lake Take a look at this To get the lake back to it s normal operating levelwe would need almost 200 000 capitols on top of all the water in the snowpack That s a lot of snow we are not likely to see in just one winter The more snowfall we get in the mountains of montana and here on the plains the more water ends up feeding into Sakakawea which means we get more water to enjoy here on the RIVER In Bismarck Ryan Davidson KX News Ryan also says that the level of the lake won t change if the amount of water coming into Lake Sakakawea is the same as the amount of water going through Garrison Dam