China News Service, Yichang, August 23. According to the Three Gorges Group, the inflow of the Three Gorges Project fell to 35,000 cubic meters per second at 8 o'clock on the 23rd. The No. 5 flood of the Yangtze River in 2020 passed the Three Gorges Project smoothly.

  During the current round of floods, the Three Gorges Project blocked a total of 7.66 billion cubic meters of floodwater, successfully resisting the largest flood peak since the construction of the reservoir at 75,000 cubic meters per second and reducing the pressure on flood control in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River.

During the passage of the flood, the power generation equipment of the Three Gorges Project was in normal operation. Photo by Tang Wei

  Affected by the continuous heavy rainfall from August 15 to 17, a number of tributaries such as the Minjiang, Tuojiang, and Fujiang tributaries in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River have historically ranked peak discharges. At 14:00 on the 17th, the Yangtze River's No. 5 flood of 2020 formed in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River; at 20 o'clock on the 17th, the inflow of the Three Gorges Project reached 51,000 cubic meters per second, and the No. 5 flood reached the Three Gorges Reservoir.

  At 8 o'clock on the 20th, a flood peak of 75,000 cubic meters per second arrived at the Three Gorges Project, and the flood peak lasted as long as 10 hours. Beginning at 18:00 on the 20th, the inflow of the Three Gorges Project has continued to decline, and by 2 o'clock on the 22nd, the inflow has dropped to 47,000 cubic meters per second.

On August 20, the flood peak of 75,000 cubic meters per second reached the Three Gorges Project, and the Three Gorges Dam opened 11 flood discharge holes. Photo by Nie Shuang

  In response to the current round of flooding, the Three Gorges Group strictly implemented the dispatching instructions of the Yangtze River Water Resources Committee of the Ministry of Water Resources to control the discharge flow at 49,200 cubic meters per second, and the peak shaving rate reached 34.4%. effect.

  The Three Gorges Group also coordinated the orderly storage and release of the Wudongde, Xiluodu, and Xiangjiaba reservoirs in the lower reaches of the Jinsha River, reducing the inflow of the Three Gorges Project by an average of about 9,000 cubic meters per second, and the accumulated storage volume reached 2.94 billion cubic meters, alleviating Sichuan and Chongqing. The flood control pressure of the river section highlights the joint flood control capacity of the cascade reservoirs on the mainstream of the Yangtze River.

  The monitoring results of the Three Gorges Group Basin Management Center show that the hydraulic structures, flood discharge facilities, and power generation equipment of the Three Gorges Project are in normal operation, and the dam's various operating indicators are good.

On August 19, the Three Gorges Dam discharged flood from ten holes. Photo by Wang Gang

  This flood process refreshed a number of records since the Three Gorges Project was built in 2003, such as the largest flood peak and the first orange flood warning. Previously, there were two floods of the order of 70,000 cubic meters per second that passed through the Three Gorges Project, which were 70,000 cubic meters per second in 2010 and 71,200 cubic meters per second in 2012.

  As of 8 o'clock on the 23rd, the Three Gorges Project has successfully responded to 9 floods since the flood season this year, including 5 numbered floods. Through multiple rounds of repeated storage and discharge, a total of nearly 29 billion cubic meters of floods were blocked, equivalent to 241 Wuhan East Lakes. (Finish)