1034, Mahanadi Vihar, Cuttack– 753004, Odisha
Online published on 16 December, 2011.
Construction of large multipurpose river valley projects have slowed down during last decade due to R and R issues and environmental concerns. For the dams so completed, the safety becomes an important aspect for safeguarding the national investment and the benefits derived by the people from the project. There are about 8,45,000 dams (2009) of all categories across the world. But in our country large dams completed are 4711 in number (2009). Besides, 390 nos. are under various stages of construction. Failure of any such water storage dam will cause serious hazards to the life and property which emphasizes monitoring the performance and safety of the structure.
Continuous surveillance of dam's safety is required during construction, during first reservoir impounding and during long term operation. Effective instrumentations in dam of 30 m high and above and their monitoring and analysis of acquisitioned data will help in assessing the safety of the dam.
At the time of construction of Hirakud Dam (1947–57) geomechanics was a new science. Usually instruments were not specified then for any dam. But due to the far sight of the brilliant engineers associated with project planning and construction of Hirakud Dam, some instruments were incorporated. The behaviour some of those embedded/installed instruments during construction and post-construction period are briefly described in this paper.
