Vantage looks different right now

This is Jon. Has anyone been paying attention to a bit of news this week? Apparently there is a crack in the Wanapum Dam down river from the metropolis of Vantage (couple hundo people at most for a population base). Apparently a 65-foot long, 2-inch wide crack is a big deal. All joking aside, they need to fix it as I'm thinking of electricity, irrigation and general safety here. To relieve pressure on the dam walls, they've lowered the water level of the mighty Columbia 20 feet, which is incredibly significant as seen below. Brittany wasn't working today, so we headed down for a quick afternoon stroll in Vantage.

See the crack there? Neither can I, but it's there, under water.

Back upstream at the boat launch. I'm standing where there should be about five feet of water.

What should be a large, deep body of water, major play area for boaters, rafters and swimmers.

I'm told the owner knows his boat is hanging out like this. Apparently he doesn't care about the pressure on the boat's keel. I didn't know exactly that the heck a "keel" was, but now I do and it's not good.

You can definitely see the water line on the cliffs to the left. During the summer recreation months, I'm told some people jump off the side. You wouldn't want to do that now.

You see the "road" on the top left portion of the pic? Yeah, that was the old road from Old Vantage before the Wanapum Dam was built. Once the dam was built and the water crept up, the old town of Vantage was submerged. Kind of creepy. One guy who was there walking around today said he lived in Vantage in the mid to late 50s before the dam was built and said he remembers when the water started flooding the old town and was there to see if he could see any remnants today. This is where the old bridge was before giving way to the new bridge that's part of I90. The old bridge is now spanning the Snake River in Idaho. They barged it to its new site. Pretty cool. We're not just about family pictures on this blog, we're about rehashing some history here too. I can point you toward a 20-minute video of it all as well, I've watched it twice.