Lake Murray

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Wednesday, September 14. 2011

Lake Murray, South Carolina, last night. In fact, it's a reservoir built for hydro power, and was the largest artificial body of water in the world when built in the 1920s.

Posted by Capt. Tom Francis at 18:21 | Comments (6) | Trackbacks (0)

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That is very pretty.

Should I worry about the "artificial" part? Is that like the biggest fake DDD, lovely to admire but raises some questions...?

#1 Bomber Girl on 2011-09-14 19:16 (Reply)

Artificial lakes are common in the US. People pretend that they are "real." But what is "real"?

#2 Bird Dog on 2011-09-14 19:37 (Reply)

Lake Superior would qualify as real, I would think.

#2.1 arcs on 2011-09-15 12:55 (Reply)

Alas, Lake Murray is not even remotely close to being "the largest artificial body of water in the world." Perhaps it was when it was completed; I don't know. What I do know is that within a few years it had been thoroughly eclipsed in every respect by Lake Mead, which in turn has been thoroughly eclipsed by still larger projects around the world. These days, Lake Murray is not even the largest in South Carolina. Though quite lovely, it is a relatively small reservoir.

#3 Chris Aarneson on 2011-09-14 19:39 (Reply)

Corrected. My error, not the Captain's.

#3.1 Bird Dog on 2011-09-14 19:46 (Reply)

"Relatively" is relative. :>)

The largest man made lake in South Carolina is Lake Marion. Lake Moultrie, part of the Santee-Cooper water system is the third largest. Murray comes in second.

At the time it's completion, Lake Murray was the largest man made reservoir in the world. It was then eclipsed by Lake Mead which was then eclipsed by Williston Lake in British Columbia which is the largest in North America.

The largest lake in the world by surface area is Lake Volta in Ghana at 3,200 square miles. Largest by volume is Lake Kariba in Zimbabwe at 41 cubic miles (that's a lot of freakin' water!). In case you're interested, Willliston Lake holds 18.5 cubic miles of water and ranks 7th largest in the world by volume.

Just by way of comparison with a natural lake, Lake Ontario, which is the smallest of the Great Lakes, holds 393 cubic miles of water with a surface area of 7,350 square miles.

#3.2 Tom Francis on 2011-09-14 20:31 (Reply)

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Wednesday, September 14. 2011

Lake Murray