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Beaver Dam Visible From Space

Posted by samzenpus on from the dam-big-job dept.

ygslash writes "The Hoover Dam no longer holds the title of the world's widest dam. Satellite photos of northern Alberta, Canada, show that several families of beavers have apparently joined forces to build a dam 850 meters wide, more than twice as wide as the Hoover Dam."

8 of 286 comments (clear)

  1. Was the Hoover Dam EVER the widest? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    The Hoover Dam isn't even a very wide dam (1234 ft)... It's known for being tall.

    1. Re:Was the Hoover Dam EVER the widest? by LurkerXXX · · Score: 5, Informative

      Not the widest in the world by a long shot. http://www.digalist.com/list/158

    2. Re:Was the Hoover Dam EVER the widest? by Bob9113 · · Score: 5, Informative

      The original article was from Fox News - I'm just amazed they realised it was a damn, and not a giant vacuum cleaner given the quality of their fact checking.

      It is, IMO, even more damning than that -- it's a wire feed article that originated with The Sun, England's answer to The New York Post. The closest they get to journalism is printing slightly fewer Bigfoot sightings than The Weekly World News.

      Having no actual investigative reporters and blindly publishing things from credible news feeds is one thing (the death-knell of traditional media's role in journalism, for example). Doing the same with a tabloid as your source is even worse.

      --
      Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
  2. Was the Hoover Dam ever the worlds widest? by Seraphim1982 · · Score: 5, Informative

    "The Hoover Dam no longer holds the title of the world's widest dam.

    Well, given the fact that the Kuybyshev Hydroelectric Station which was built in the 50's is almost 3000m wide, it's been a LONG time since the Hoover Dam was the worlds widest. Given the fact that the Hoover Dam is very narrow for a its overall size, I'd be pretty surprised if it was ever the worlds widest.

  3. Fox thinks pretty highly of those beavers by NathanBullock · · Score: 5, Informative

    I liked the last paragraph of the article "It is thought that several beaver families joined forces to create the massive dam, containing thousands of trees, and took many months to complete it."

    Compare that to the article from the CBC "Biologists estimate the dam would have taken at least 20 years to build. It is visible in NASA satellite imagery from 1990."

  4. 850 meters??? by TrisexualPuppy · · Score: 5, Informative

    Leave this one to the Chinese. The Three Gorges Dam is almost thrice as long, 2335 meters. PLEASE check your facts before accepting these submissions.

    And if anyone cares, here's an obligatory Google map of the beaver dam and here's one for Three Gorges Dam.

    1. Re:850 meters??? by Derf+the · · Score: 5, Informative

      Whoa there buddy; easy on the capitals there.

      The Egyptians put up one 3830m wide (the Aswan High Dam) in the 1960's.

      It's Fox News; do you want to fact check The Onion as well?

      --
      No. You can't look at my Sig; it's mine, and I'm not showing you.
  5. Re:Bigger is Better by lbourn · · Score: 5, Informative

    Funny that beaver dams never break. You would think that since they're made out of untreated wood, that the water would rot them at some random point that beavers can't even foresee....

    I don't know if you were joking, but beaver dams break all the time. Usually they're not huge breaches but little leaks, and not usually due to wood rotting but due to mud washing out and sticks coming loose. The little guys are constantly repairing and mending the dams. They have OCD and can't stand the sound of running water -- that's their trigger to fix the dam.