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June 30, 2025

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1 Homepage Slider 3 Top Story

Study of Conowingo Provides Groundbreaking Findings on Sediment Impact

August 27, 2014 by Dave Wheelan

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In May of this year, Colonel Richard Jordan of the  U.S. Army Corp of Engineers, testified before a Senate subcommittee on the preliminary findings of his team’s three-year assessment of the Conowingo and Lower Susquehanna watershed damage to the Chesapeake Bay during catastrophic weather. While Col. Jordan’s statement received scant attention in Maryland’s mainstream media at the time, it was a particularly unique moment of clarity in the ongoing debate about the role and accountability for the Conowingo.

In his Spy interview, Col. Jordan outlines the purpose and process of this multi-layered, scientifically driven, study on the water system, and offers some surprising conclusions about sediment and nutrient activity during major storms. He also highlights his team’s most remarkable finding that only 20% of the sediment that flows into the Bay when bad weather hits actually comes from the Conowingo section of the Lower Susquehanna.  For the rest of the 80%, the report suggests one needs to look North.

This video is approximately ten minutes in length 

The Spy Newspapers may periodically employ the assistance of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the clarity and accuracy of our content.

Filed Under: 1 Homepage Slider, 3 Top Story

About Dave Wheelan

Hugh & Zane Campbell at The Mainstay, Sept. 6 Seed Saving And Unspoken Poetry At Library

Letters to Editor

  1. Michael Johnson says

    August 27, 2014 at 3:31 PM

    Where is the science ? This guy in trying to minimize the obvious with inferences. He delivers not concrete or empirical and empirical evidence would say other wise. I have driven over the Susquehanna in the morning and the river looked normal , they open the gates and a coffee with cream colored plume stretches down the bay and across the susquehanna flats. It is a rare storm indeed that produces that kind of water coming out of the Sassafras or Elk that color. like a 100 year storm. The only factual statements he makes are concerning the cost. My computer model shows that he is trying to help his employers skirt the issue.

    • Keith Thompson says

      August 28, 2014 at 11:11 AM

      This whole thing comes off as the typical federal government response of kicking the can down the road, or in this case, kicking the silt down the river. I don’t really quibble with the numbers, but the spin on them is typical of someone saying “this ain’t my problem” and pinning the blame elsewhere.

      • Bob Kramer says

        August 29, 2014 at 7:10 AM

        Keith… that’s a Ding Dong BINGO. It’s unfortunate that the state, the Chesapeake Bay Foundation and Exelon have been kicking the silt down the river for too many years now. It’s time to fix it… and the Clean Chesapeake Coalition has some pretty good answers.

  2. Michael Johnson says

    August 27, 2014 at 7:02 PM

    The Colonel’s argument has lots of holes in it. The rain from TS Lee fell far, far away from farms and fields that drain into the other rivers of the upper bay and the devastation from the silt load was catastrophic. Even if the Colonel and his computer models are partially correct it doesn’t justify ignoring the issues connected to the dam. The correction will be costly but that cost should have been built into the leases long ago and organizations like Chesapeake Bay Foundation and MD DNR should have focused on it long long ago. We have been more than patient enough with theses people considering their pathetic track record as supposed stewards of our natural resources ! Farmers and fisherman have suffered through their dictates for decades with no benefit to anybody or any thing. Even though the dredging won’t be cheap it will reduce the cost of keeping channels open in the upper bay. There is too much potential benefit to not give it a try. If the companies like Excelon don’t want to help with the cost take the damn dam out. The bay was fine before it was built.

  3. Fred Patt says

    August 28, 2014 at 9:10 AM

    It would be great to get a transcript of his Senate subcommitte testimony.

    • Ben Ford says

      September 1, 2014 at 9:20 AM

      Complete Report here:

      https://www.epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Files.View&FileStore_id=2f250d35-4fc6-48e2-906f-755617e96180

  4. Steve Payne says

    September 7, 2014 at 8:26 PM

    Japan appears to have a great deal of experience in this type of problem.

    https://ecohyd.dpri.kyoto-u.ac.jp/data/sumi/2010/201015.pdf

    https://www.ieahydro.org/reports/Annex_VIII_CaseStudy0402_Miwa_Japan.pdf

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