Florida - Tuesday August 22, 2023: During last Friday's weekly status update on Lake Okeechobee, the Army Corps' South Florida Deputy Commander Maj. Cory Bell again re-iterated that there has been no change in the Corps’ wet season strategy. They are not allowing any water released from Lake O to flow, unchecked, all the way down the C-44 canal, past the S-80 lock and dam, into the St. Lucie River estuary.
But there have been releases from the Lake into the canal itself, to maintain sufficient levels for navigation. Following which there have been subsequent releases from the canal, past the lock and dam into the estuary.
The most recent was just this past Friday morning said Bell, following heavy rain the night before. “We did have to open the St. Lucie Lock and Dam spillway to start outflows to recede back to our normal operating depth in the C-44 canal. And the total CFS (cubic feet per second) that came out of the S-80 (the lock and dam) was approximately 700 CFS per one hour of operation.”
That’s about 18-million gallons of water, none of which the corps believed to have been contaminated, despite an outbreak of cyanobacteria in the canal the week before at Timer Powers Park in Indiatown.
As of Tuesday, the Lake level was 15.36 inches, 2.7 feet higher than last year at this time, and about a foot and a half below the 16-and-a-half-foot level when releases, contaminated by algae or not, may become necessary.
“We understand the concerns of the high-water levels in Lake Okeechobee, and we acknowledge that there is a risk of higher releases later in the west season," said Bell. "But we are going to do our best to avoid them if at all possible.”