Water from spillway starts overflowing as Hub Dam fills to capacity

Following heavy rains in the Dureji and Shah Noorani areas of Balochistan, water from the Hub Dam, which attained its maximum conservation capacity of 339.15 feet on Sunday morning, has started overflowing towards the Arabian Sea through its 6,020-foot long spillway, Wapda officials and Lasbela district administration officials said on Sunday.

The water level in the Hub reservoir, which supplies 100 million gallons of water per day to Karachi and around 66mgd of water to the Lasbela district and its Hub Tehsil, was around 338.05 feet on Saturday, but after the recent rains in the catchment area of dam, which is spread over 3,500 kilometers in Balochistan, the dam filled to its capacity and water started overflowing through its spillway on Sunday morning, they added.

“Hub is still receiving water from its catchment area and more streams of water are expected to reach the dam in the coming 24 to 48 hours due to rains. The spillway of the Hub Dam is not gated and we call it Ogee Type. Whenever the dam is filled to capacity, it starts overflowing from its spillway automatically,” an official of Wapda told The News.

The official maintained that they had already apprised the district administrations of South and West districts in Karachi and Lasbela in Balochistan to take precautionary measures in the wake of the dam getting filled to its maximum capacity. The official added that the authorities in Karachi and Balochistan were already on high alert.

According to the Wapda official, rainwater was still pouring into the reservoir because it has a huge catchment area comprising the Dadu district and the Kirthar National Park in Sindh and Daruna, Duraji and Shah Noorani in Balochistan.

On the other hand, Deputy Commissioner Lasbela Iftikhar Bugti said they had increased police patrolling around the Hub Dam’s spillway and the Hub River after water started overflowing from the spillway of the dam. He added that vehicles were not being allowed to cross the Hub River due to the increased flow of water.