PLAINFIELD – The Hazard Mitigation Committee (HMC) holds a meeting at 7 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 17, at the Plainfield Town Hall. Green Mountain Power (GMP) will be on hand to discuss its draft Emergency Action Plan (EAP) for the Marshfield Dam.
The Marshfield Dam’s emergency spillway stop log gate will be the subject of a Hazard Mitigation Meeting on October 17.
“Plainfield residents live downstream from a big dam,” wrote Michael Billingsley, HMC secretary in a recent Facebook post. “Its safety is everyone’s concern. To plan for a possible dam break or emergency release, GMP (the owner) has prepared an EAP. How does it work if the dam is threatened by a storm? Where would you go for safety?”
“If you are curious if your home is in an inundation zone; if you want to study how you would evacuate; if you know friends or neighbors who would be in potential danger you are welcome to join GMP and Plainfield’s HMC for a discussion,” suggested Billingsley.
Plainfield and Marshfield have been in active discussion with GMP about a 2022 draft of the EAP, said Billingsley. He added there were no problems at the dam in either July of 2023 or July of 2024 because the 23.5 square mile dam catchment area in Cabot, Marshfield and Peacham didn’t receive that much rain. In each case GMP reported the dam performed according to design. Billingsley feels, “That’s because… frankly… nothing remarkable at all happened at the dam, and the reservoir didn’t rise that much.”
The dam “hasn’t been tested by a real rainfall event since May 26-27, 2011,” earlier in the year of Hurricane Irene, said Billingsley. “In that event the dam didn’t perform that well and we don’t want to see a repeat of those issues.” Afterward Plainfield asked the Public Service Board to conduct an investigation that was partly motivated by that event, according to Billingsley.
“The outcome of that, and other factors, was that GMP did millions of dollars of upgrades and repairs to the dam, making it more safe,” said Billingsley, “with one glaring exception. So Plainfield’s Hazard Mitigation Committee is still at work trying to make that dam less hazardous.”
Plainfield’s mobile number for emergency contact is (802) 380-6408.
