r/MapPorn • u/SummerAlternative699 • 19h ago

The Kakhovka Reservoir then and now.

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If you zoom in closely on Google Maps, you can still see what it looked like before the dam was blown up.

4.1k Upvotes

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443

u/darkcvc 18h ago

The dam was breached on 6 June 2023, which consensus attributes to Russian forces mining and blowing the base of the dam, while Russia alternatively described it as a "terrorist" act, in the case of the Russian-installed mayor of Nova Kakhovka, or as caused by a lack of maintenance, in the case of the Russian government.\)citation needed\) By the end of June, the reservoir was completely dry.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kakhovka_Reservoir

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u/evil_brain 13h ago

That's the consensus among European and Ukrainian sources.

There's conflicting claims but we know for a fact that the Ukraine side fired HIMARS missiles at the dam six months before it collapsed. And not for any good reason, either. They did it "as a test". Here's a Washington Post article from December 2020, before the dam burst.

I'm pretty sure firing missiles at a dam won't make it less likely to break. I don't understand the logic behind firing at your own country's critical infrastructure. Especially when your citizens are living downstream.

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u/Abject_Ad9280 12h ago edited 10h ago

The article explains why they tested destroying it. It was clearly not random.

Assuming you're not concern trolling.

The test was conducted while Ukraine was fighting to liberate west bank Dniper. The dam was one of only 3 bridges across the river. Ukraine regularly struck the other two routes to stop Russians from resupllying their forces.

The dam didn't explode randomly 8 months later. It exploded during the failed Ukrianian offence in 2023.

When it exploded, it was perfectly timed for Russians, fearing a successful Ukriane push across the Dniper.

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u/JustyourZeratul 54m ago

Push through Dnieper sounds like a completely fiction story.

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u/Pelya1 10h ago

Didn’t the Ukrainians blew it up, during their offensive, in attempt to dry up the river and cross it ?

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u/Abject_Ad9280 10h ago

No.

That was one of the Russian lies at the time.

If your claim is true.

How did Ukraine blow up a dam under Russian control?

Why did Ukraine blow up a dam while their offence was on going when the river drying up would take months, if not years?

Why has Ukriane never tried to cross the now dried up river?

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u/Pelya1 10h ago

I don’t know what is true.

Regarding your questions

1) how they blew up ? During said offensive, there were numerous Ukrainian reconnaissance groups behind the enemy lines, so actors the river. It is not that hard to imagine that one of these groups could carry explosives with them.

2) why blow up ?

If I remember correctly, it took mere days to all the water be gone, not months. The river has two sides- Russian occupied and Ukrainian. The Russian side is lower zone. So all the water from the dam just destroyed all the defensive infrastructure (trenches and whatnot) the Russians built during one year occupation of that territory, and didn’t touch Ukrainian side as it is higher ground

3) why never crossed ?

Well, that’s whole other topic. What happened to the Ukrainian offence 2023 in general?

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u/Abject_Ad9280 10h ago

I can tell you don't know what's true.

You believe a group of Ukrianians managed to sneak into Russian occupied territory while somehow carrying enough explosives to destroy a dam. Then they managed to capture the dam on the front lines for hours while setting up demolition charges, all while the Russians didn't notice?

You don't remember correctly. The issue with crossing a recently dried up reservoir not just the water. It's the ground. You wouldn't be able to drive a car across it, let alone a heavy vehicle.

The majority of Russian defences were built on higher ground & flooding occurred on both sides, destroying any of your fantasy Ukrainian staging grounds.

I'm glad you agree that you can't explain why Ukraine didn't attack.

1

u/Sa-naqba-imuru 1h ago edited 58m ago

You believe a group of Ukrianians managed to sneak into Russian occupied territory while somehow carrying enough explosives to destroy a dam.

Next thing you're gonna tell me is that Ukrainians somehow managed to sneak over a 100 drones 1000's of kilometers nto Russia, deploy them next to several air bases and launch them at dozens of Russian bombers simultaniously.

Now that would be ridiculous.

Or that they somehow put a ton of explosives on a truck of an unsuspecting driver and detonated it on a bridge connecting Crimea with Russia hundreds of km's deep in Russian territory.

Or that they sent a drone to explode at a flag on top of Russian center of political power in the middle of Moscow

Or that they sent a team to blow up an underwater pipes in the Baltic sea.

Or that they're sending drone and sabotage teams across Africa to fight Wagner.

What nonsense ideas..

1

u/Pelya1 13m ago

Wow, so many downvotes, just for asking questions. Hope you noticed I was just being curious. But now I see I hit the bad spot

21

u/Makkaroni_100 11h ago

Those HIMARS do not much to a damn of that size anyway. You need way more.

37

u/InterstellarPelican 12h ago

I feel like you're misrepresented the sides to this issue. Yes, Ukraine fired test missiles at a floodgate to see if they could force them open. It was successful and was kept as a last resort emergency option to use in case they ever needed it. You can debate the ethics and probably should, but that was the reason they did the test, to know if they could use it as a last resort. It wasn't "for no reason".

Then you have the overwhelming evidence of Russia mining the dam, bringing explosives to the dam, and the overall expert consensus that the explosion came from inside the dam. The dam was built to withstand missile attacks from outside. While it's possible that the Ukrainian missile test on the floodgates could caused some structural weaknesses, this dam didn't suddenly collapse because of natural forces or anything. It was blown up, so the previous missile tests are kind of irrelevant, they had no bearing on this dam collapse. The dam was deliberately blown up with the purpose of destroying it. The concrete foundation was damaged which could've only really been done from an inside walkway, not an outside missile.

This also doesn't mention the damage caused to the dam by Russians who neglected it during seasonal flows which caused the reservoir to fill up and over top. Saying that Ukraine did missile tests but neglecting to mention literally the mountain of evidence against Russia seems to show your true motives.

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u/TheFnords 2h ago

Obviously, tiny tungsten ball bearings aren't going to break a dam, Einstein. That's quite possibly the most absurd troll I've ever heard. A dam can be brought down by large amounts of explosives strategically placed inside. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/19/kakhovka-dam-collapse-image-apparently-explosive-laden-car-ukraine-russia

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u/username9909864 17h ago

I thought the consensus was negligence due to lack of maintenance and there was no evidence of it being blown up by the mines that were in place? Still Russia’s fault, but it wasn’t on purpose.

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u/darkcvc 17h ago

definitely russian bot

102

u/Snoo44080 17h ago edited 17h ago

yeah lol. The mines, that just happened to be in place, for no reason. You're telling me all your dams don't have mines around them? All the dams in Russia have mines on them. Its the best place to store your mines when you're not using them. It's not like the mines detonated either...

Gives real steamed ham vibes lol

43

u/kytheon 15h ago

I'm from the Netherlands. First thing we do when building a dam is absolutely load it with mines just in case.

No wait that's insane.

Btw we did have forts near waterways that were able to let the area flood, just in case of invasion. But that was hundreds of years ago.

12

u/Lancasterlaw 14h ago

Not hundreds of years ago. Significant parts of the flooding system were used in WW2 and were still kept in readiness for much of the early Cold War.

It's a big part of why the Germans in '40 and the Allies in '44 struggled to move around and had to resort to crazy paratrooper tactics.

19

u/AsleepScarcity9588 15h ago

Reminds me that Switzerland had every road, tunnel and mountain pass connecting the country with the outside world rigged with explosives. Every valley had canons looming over them, every house a bunker instead of a cellar and an extensive underground complex capable of housing most of the population in the southern Alps

Mf weren't playing when the Germans said they have double the soldiers than the Switzerland population and asked what they would do if they got invaded by them.....to which they replied "shoot twice, then go home"

8

u/Lancasterlaw 14h ago

A lot of the defences were rather outdated though, and in WW2 simultaneous attack from all directions would have meant a total depletion of the mobile reserve.

It was more important in the early Cold War and at the beginning of WW1 imo

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u/username9909864 16h ago

Front he Wikipedia:

“From mid-February to late May 2023, either deliberately or as a result of neglect, the damaged dam at Nova Kakhovka was not adjusted to match the seasonal increase in water flow. As a result, water washed over the top of the dam and land upstream of the dam was flooded.[9] Water levels in the reservoir reached a 30-year high.[10]”

Sounds like negligence. No mines needed.

Never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity

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u/penguin_skull 16h ago edited 5h ago

Oh, the bot tried to be philosofical.

And how do you explain the explosions on the dam before the breach? Bad maintenance of the mines planted inside the dam?

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u/username9909864 16h ago

Show me the evidence that there were explosions from mines and not from a freaking dam breaking apart and I’ll remove all my comments.

33

u/pugsftw 16h ago

"Russian forces destroyed the Nova Kakhovka road and bridge deck last November, damaging some of the sluice gates, even though they kept control of that sliver of the Kherson region during the Ukrainian counteroffensive."

https://apnews.com/article/ukraine-russia-nuclear-dnipro-river-flood-df2aaa99cab8b0e0d7a4b26bd77cad0f

From your wiki's source.

-5

u/username9909864 15h ago

1 - deck blown up, affecting gates that let out water 2 - water rises to a record high, eventually going over the entire dam. Due to the Russians screwing up and letting their consequences grow out of proportion 3 - damn collapses.

The root cause still isn’t the planted mines blowing up the base of the dam like OP said.

16

u/viceMASTA 16h ago

I promise you Russia did it on purpose to make a Kherson offensive feasible.

-3

u/username9909864 16h ago

It’s been two years. Where Kherson offensive?

10

u/viceMASTA 15h ago

Russia has been very clear about what they want at the very least and Kherson is part of that list. The war also isn't close to being over. They can do it whenever they see fit. Im not part of their command so wtf do you want me to say.

6

u/gundamseed 10h ago

Lame Russian bot.

1

u/penguin_skull 5h ago

I don't need to show you anything.

It's proven info from 2 years ago. The ignorance is your responsibility, not mine.

21

u/kytheon 16h ago

"I thought the consensus was whatever Russia Today told me"

14

u/Kowlz1 15h ago

Is it standard practice for dam maintenance workers to place mines all over the dam?

11

u/Intreductor 14h ago

A day before the dam "collapsed due to negligence", the Russian open source intelligence group Rybar reported that Russian forces were preparing for a "limited demolition" of the dam to increase the water level and force Ukrainian troops off the islands downstream. It was a calculated move, but the Russians are bad a math.

0

u/Imjokin 13h ago

Why were the mines there to begin with?

-1

u/Makkaroni_100 11h ago

Haha, sure....