The thunderous roar of the swollen Yantic River cascading over the 95-foot-wide spillway of the Fitchville Pond Dam, a 19th-century artifact of a tiny village’s past as a thriving textile manufacturer, was dramatic, if relatively unconcerning.
It was the quiet, steady flow from an abutment at the edge of the stone and concrete dam that drew the attention of a firefighter who shot a video on a smart phone in the pre-dawn darkness. One of Connecticut’s aging and privately owned “high-hazard” dams was leaking.
The discovery Wednesday of the leak down the hill from Bozrah’s sturdy stone town hall, itself a repurposed relic of an extinct industry, set off an all-day scramble: the evacuation of downstream homes in Norwich, a temporary repair and the beginning of an expensive assessment by the state of what to do next.
“This is a privately owned dam, so our role here is in an emergency posture,” said Katie Dykes, the commissioner of the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection. “We’ve got several contractors that we brought on scene to be able to provide for emergency assistance.”
Dykes joined Gov. Ned Lamont and other state and local officials at the scene to brief reporters. As the flood waters caused by heavy rains and melting snow receded during the day, pressure on the dam abated, and leaking slowed to a trickle. By nightfall, the evacuation order was rescinded.
The incident draws attention to Connecticut’s decade-old, public-private system of inspecting the 3,300 dams that fall under its regulatory authority: A nine-person dam safety unit enforces a requirement that owners of dams submit safety assessments conducted by licensed professional engineers.
The unit’s relationship with the Bozrah Water Works, the dam’s owner and one of the businesses owned by the locally prominent Adelman family, has been fraught for years, beginning in the era when the state was responsible for the inspections. The Adelmans have owned the dam since at least 1979, according to one inspection report.
At least once every decade in the 1960s, ’70s and ’80s, the state ordered repairs or other work on the dam, according to an inspection report provided Wednesday night by DEEP.
The state deemed the dam unsafe in 1963 and ordered repairs that were completed in 1964. A decade later, the state found leakage and again ordered repairs. Unspecified “remedial work” was ordered in 1987.
Connecticut passed a law in 2014 that transferred responsibility for inspecting privately owned dams to their owners and another in 2016 requiring that owners of dams classified as Class C (high hazard) and Class B (significant hazard) prepare an emergency action plan and update it every two years. The first inspection was due in 2015, the emergency action plan in 2017.
According to a summary of violation notices released Wednesday night, the company never submitted either one. (An inspection report did note, however, a 30-year-old emergency plan was on file.)
Seymour Adelman, who is variously listed in public records as an owner or agent for Bozrah Water Works, did not respond to a call for comment.
DEEP commissioned its own emergency inspection of the dam in September 2021 and then a full inspection by Fuss & O’Neill in July 2022. The engineering firm concluded that the dam should remain listed as a Class C high hazard dam.
“Failure of the dam is likely to cause major damage to the downstream state roadway bridge (Route 608, Fitchville Road) and utility crossings (30 inch water supply pipe for the City of Norwich), potential damage to habitable structures in the flood inundation area, major economic damage, and potential loss of life,” the firm warned. “An up-to-date dam breach analysis would help clarify potential damage to habitable structures.”
Technically, a Class C designation means loss of life is deemed probable, not potential, in a failure. Also downstream is an electric substation and a firehouse in the Yantic section of Norwich.
The draft inspection report noted “major cracks” and a history of “seepage” from a concrete wall to the left of the spillway if looking downstream, the same side of the dam that was leaking Wednesday. The report still is deemed a draft because it never was signed by the owner.
“The dam has had a history of foundation leakage, and leakage through the stone masonry,” the report said.
Graham Stevens, who oversees DEEP’s bureau of water protection and land reuse, said the incident showed the system is working, despite the alleged non-compliance over nearly a decade.
“The one thing I’d say about this event is there was great work on behalf of the town of Bozrah and the city of Norwich, and the emergency apparatus in the state of Connecticut worked,” Stevens said. “They activated the right people, the experts, and we brought in contractors and other experts.”
Crushed rock was piled Wednesday against the portion of the dam structure that was leaking.
Chuck Lee, a supervisor in the dam safety unit, said the agency was issuing an emergency contract for the construction of a cofferdam — essentially a dam in front of the dam. With a cofferdam in place, the area in front of the dam can be drained and engineers can make a more detailed assessment of the damage and threat.
It is a relatively small dam — 200 feet wide and 27 feet high — that was constructed in 1871 as an earthen and stone dam to serve downstream mills of the Palmer Brothers Company in the Fitchville village of Bozrah, just upstream from Norwich. In 1914, it was reinforced with concrete poured over its stone work, including the spillway.
With mills in Fitchville and New London, Palmer Brothers manufactured upscale quilts and bedding for department stores and mail-order customers. It foundered during the Great Depression, rebounded with a contract to supply blankets to the U.S. Army and ceased production a year after the end of World War II.
The dam no longer has an industrial use. But it created Fitchville Pond, a recreational asset to a campground on the pond that Norwich Mayor Peter Nystrom says also is owned by the Adelman family. Nystrom said the Adelman family has played a positive role in civic life.
A watershed of 68.5 square miles drains into the Yantic, which flows into the Thames River.
“We’re grateful for the attention from the state, our governor joining us today,” said Nystrom, the mayor of Norwich. “Hopefully this dam will not go. That’s our biggest fear right now.”
“People are telling me they’ve never seen the Yantic River as full as it is today,” Lamont said. “It goes back to the flooding of 1938, maybe Noah.”
More rain was forecast for the weekend.
This story was originally published by the Connecticut Mirror.