Between the River and the Town

JULY 21, 2026 – EARLY MORNING – PITTSBURGH

Volume: 2\,084\,447\,059 cubic feet | Inflow: 192.99 CFS

Matt Foltz begins his mornings at 6 a.m. with coffee and computer screens.

Matt works in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Pittsburgh District’s water management section. He runs numbers on water information within the district’s 26,000-square-mile footprint: river flows, reservoir elevations, weather alerts, forecasts, data from places hundreds of miles away from his office in downtown Pittsburgh. The numbers will go out to a litany of partner organizations that use the data for their own decisions.

The numbers model the layout at 16 reservoirs in five states and tell him how the district might need to change reservoir outflows for the day. There were storms last night in the upper Monongahela River basin, so he expects to see minor flooding in a few isolated areas – it’s never news he wants to see, but he’s thankful it wasn’t worse.

The models suggest substantially more water in southwestern Pennsylvania and northern West Virginia than previously forecast. Stonewall Jackson Lake, near Weston, may even approach one of its five highest pools on record but not break the record.

The National Weather Service in Charleston issues a flood watch in the area starting at 1 p.m. It warns thunderstorms may release between 2 and 4 inches of rain.

Matt makes a few calls, sips his coffee, and keeps crunching numbers.

MIDMORNING – STONEWALL JACKSON LAKE

Volume: 2\,083\,290\,977 cubic feet | Inflow: 56.66 CFS

In a maintenance shed 130 miles south of Matt, David Johnson is on his third cup of coffee.

He’s working his usual 7:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. shift, as he has on and off for the seven years he’s worked as a maintenance mechanic at Stonewall Jackson Lake. He and the four other staff are following routine procedures for when a few inches of rain are expected – in his case, he’s spending the day doing dam checks and making sure equipment is safe from the rain.

The reservoir is eight-tenths of an inch below summer pool. Water is still leaving the dam at about 80 cubic feet per second, a small, routine release used to help maintain the downstream flow schedule at Clarksburg.

Stormwater that fell in the 101-square-mile upstream basin the previous day collects behind the dam. Water that fell on hillsides, roads, fields, hollows, rooftops, and forests is trailing downhill to lower ground, eventually stopped only by a 90-foot-tall semihollow concrete wall.

LATE MORNING – PITTSBURGH

Volume: 2\,084\,447\,059 cubic feet | Inflow: 33.75 CFS

The inflow of water from yesterday’s storms near Stonewall Jackson Lake is starting to calm down. The dam is releasing a modest 80 cubic feet of water per second (CFS), and in the five hours Matt’s been at work, the amount of water going into the reservoir decreased from almost 200 CFS to below 35 CFS.

He’s not worried about whether the dam can weather a lot of rain in quick succession. It’s about the numbers: Lewis, Randolph and Upshur counties are now expected to receive between 4 and 8 inches of rain, double the previous prediction from mere hours before.

Another water manager is rerunning forecasts as new model information comes in. Matt puts together the briefing information: rainfall, inflows, reservoir elevations, planned releases, downstream effects – all the information someone would need to make a tough call on short notice.

EARLY AFTERNOON – STONEWALL JACKSON LAKE

Volume: 2\,082\,134\,894 cubic feet | Inflow: 1\,134.27 CFS

Unremarkable rain patters on the corrugated shed roof.

An alert lights up David’s phone. The National Weather Service issued Severe Thunderstorm Watch 506 for 117 counties across five states, including Buckhannon in Upshur County and Weston in Lewis County.

Weston is three miles away from him.

MIDAFTERNOON – PITTSBURGH

Volume: 2\,082\,134\,894 cubic feet | Inflow: 1\,415.7 CFS

Matt is tense.

His computer shows the lake is storing more than 2 billion cubic feet of water, weighing nearly 130 billion pounds. The dam is designed to handle the volume and maintains the 80 CFS outflow, but the reservoir’s inflow is concerning: It increased by 1,370 CFS in the last four hours, and 400 CFS in the last hour alone. Right now, it’s receiving nearly 1,416 CFS, equivalent to one Olympic-size swimming pool of water per minute and climbing.

The concern isn’t limited to increasing inflow. The National Weather Service radar shows a severe thunderstorm moving east across central Lewis and Upshur counties, warning of 60 mph wind gusts.

Ten minutes later, someone 4 miles southwest of the dam reports half-inch hail. Two miles west-southwest, a tree collapses on a road. So far, 200 people lost power.

Matt is tense for another reason: dozens of his cousins, aunts, uncles, and other relatives live within 30 miles of Buckhannon.

LATE AFTERNOON – STONEWALL JACKSON LAKE

Volume: 2\,115\,661\,284 cubic feet | Inflow: 3\,659.93 CFS

Rain strikes forest canopy, pavement, pastures, rooftops, homes, businesses, schools and the steep sides of West Virginia hollows. Stonewall Jackson Dam can capture and store much of the runoff flowing into the reservoir from upstream, but rain falling downstream of the dam drains directly into creeks, streams, and rivers without ever passing through the dam.

The first burst drops roughly 1.5 inches of rain. With 2 inches expected, David figures much of the storm has probably already passed. He leaves at 4 p.m. and makes his 81-mile drive home.

A state away, the water management team is running more numbers. In portions of the watershed directly above the reservoir, analyses indicate rainfall with an annual exceedance probability of a roughly 1-in-200-year event. In some uncontrolled areas – places where runoff does not pass through the reservoir – the modeled precipitation frequency is rarer still.

The team’s final analysis estimates roughly 6.2 inches of rain will fall around Stonewall Jackson Lake and considerably more in parts of the surrounding basin, including Buckhannon and Weston, in less than 12 hours.

EARLY EVENING – PITTSBURGH

Volume: 2\,123\,753\,861 cubic feet | Inflow: 12\,902.42 CFS

There’s not much left Matt can do. For 10 hours, he’s run models and numbers and numbers and models ad nauseam. He’s made the requisite operational recommendations. He’s laid out courses of action for myriad scenarios – so he heads home. Matt spends his night glued to his phone for news updates and check-ins from family in the area.

At Stonewall Jackson Lake, the amount of water flowing in per second has increased nearly ten times. There’s more than 48 million pounds of water per minute, enough to fill nearly nine Olympic-size swimming pools.

The National Weather Service issues a flash flood warning covering northern Lewis County and surrounding areas and warns of torrential rainfall. At 5:56 p.m., its radar places a severe thunderstorm near Weston, still moving east toward Buckhannon. First responders are spread throughout the area.

More than 40,000 people live there.

EARLY EVENING – 81 MILES SOUTH OF WESTON

Volume: 2\,123\,753\,861 cubic feet | Inflow: 12\,902.42 CFS

David keeps his phone’s weather location set to Weston, and he’s getting alerts like clockwork.

SEVERE THUNDERSTORM. FLASH FLOODING.

Out of curiosity, he checks the U.S. Geological Survey’s website to look at dam gauges.

The downstream river gauge rises roughly 8 feet in about 45 minutes. David knows the dam’s outflow is still dialed to only 80 CFS, so something’s in the way – a tree, debris, or some kind of obstruction in the river.

He calls his supervisor, Jeff Toler, who lives 8 miles from the dam. Jeff has already been in touch periodically throughout the evening to make sure David and his three other staff members are safe. Jeff tells David downstream tributaries like Washburn Run are taking tremendous amounts of runoff, but he reassures David the dam itself is fine.

He hangs up and refreshes the gauge website.

EVENING – WESTON

Volume: 2\,213\,450\,870 cubic feet | Inflow: 14\,886.64 CFS

West Virginia’s governor declares a state of emergency and issues a shelter-in-place order, and reports come in of flooded roads and landslides around Weston. Power outages abound. Floodwater barrages homes and businesses. Photographs show water inside a Walmart, as much as a foot deep in some places. Vehicles sit in floodwaters.

First responders are handling water rescues and evacuations, and the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources deploys a dozen officers with swift-water rescue boats and drones to rescue people.

SUNSET – WESTON

Volume: 2\,414\,363\,094 cubic feet | Inflow: 16\,322.07 CFS

Every minute, more water enters Stonewall Jackson Lake than it would take to fill 11 Olympic-size swimming pools. Each minute adds 61 million pounds.

The West Fork River, which flows directly through the dam and into Weston, is beginning to crest at 18.8 feet. The dam is holding back more than 16,300 CFS from entering the river, but the river is still collecting enough downstream runoff to push 3,500 CFS through Weston. Otherwise, more than 20,500 CFS would be engulfing the town.

Only about one-sixth as much water is moving through Weston as there would be without the dam, but there’s little relief for the town. The Weston Fire Department has to evacuate its own fire station. Reports come in of people stranded in their cars. A report notes only eight minutes passed between when water first touched someone’s yard and when their property flooded. One person reports hypothermia.

AFTER DARK – 81 MILES SOUTH OF WESTON

Volume: 2\,449\,210\,223 cubic feet | Inflow: 16\,865 CFS

At 10 p.m., the rain is over, but check-in texts from David’s coworkers are sparse. Cell towers are down. The downstream river gauge level continues rising. The rain is over, but it’s not what was originally predicted.

David calls his supervisor and offers to make the 81-mile trip back to the dam, assuming there aren’t mudslides or flooding on the route, to verify the instrumentation isn’t damaged and check the gauges in person. If something is wrong, no one has a reliable way to know.

Jeff’s not worried about the dam structurally, but he thinks over the offer, makes a few calls and gives David the green light. Jeff’s not sure anyone else can get to the dam at all, let alone safely.

David tells his wife he may not be home for a while.

BEFORE MIDNIGHT – STONEWALL JACKSON LAKE

Volume: 2\,474\,483\,735 cubic feet | Inflow: 15\,307.87 CFS

David has never seen anything like this.

Water is entering Stonewall Jackson Lake tonight at a higher rate than has ever been recorded in the dam’s history. Water continues entering the reservoir, but the rate is beginning to stabilize. A lake’s volume and its inflow do not change simultaneously – the reservoir will continue storing flood runoff from the basin and will not crest for two more days. At its peak on July 23, the lake will hold 2,594,257,182 cubic feet of water.

Downstream, runoff water roars through the valley. It bursts from drainage ditches, hillsides, tributaries, culverts, and then rips through every depression from every direction except the dam. Water spills from crossings and walkways and roads, carrying soil and rocks. Small trees and other debris clog culverts. The ear-splitting cacophony sounds as though waterfalls are crashing from all sides.

It’s mostly pitch black, too – except for a few lights running on an on-site generator. David needs his sedan’s headlights to see.

From the top of the dam, the lake is an empty void.

David will spend the next five hours here alone.

JULY 22, PREDAWN – EIGHT MILES SOUTH OF WESTON

Volume: 2\,519\,976\,056 cubic feet | Inflow: 4\,992.06 CFS

2:30 a.m., refresh, 3 a.m., refresh…

Jeff isn’t sleeping. He’s one of the lucky few in the area who didn’t lose power, but his neighborhood’s roads are flooded. He’s spending his time refreshing websites with water and weather information: USGS, NOAA, the district’s water management page. He checks his window every few minutes to see whether it is safe for him to drive yet.

When service allows, he gets reports from David, who’s inside the dam taking readings and checking the uplift cells, the gauges, the grounds, and the dam itself like clockwork. He says the outflow is still reeled back to 80 CFS and, structurally, everything is working the way it’s supposed to.

Jeff was never worried about the dam – it’s well-maintained, he’s worked at reservoirs for 35 years, and like Matt, this is not his first flood. However, past storms put much of their rain upstream, so the reservoir caught much of the runoff. This storm hammered the uncontrolled watershed below the dam.

Jeff is concerned about his three employees – Scott, Amanda and Jess, who are either sheltering in place, partially flooded, or both. His one non-local employee is alone at a dark federal project surrounded by flood debris, lacerated communications, and roads that may or may not be underwater.

The facility internet isn’t working, either – a tree fell on it.

4:15 a.m., refresh, 5 a.m., refresh… Jeff gets in his car.

SUNRISE – STONEWALL JACKSON LAKE

Volume: 2\,549\,040\,595 cubic feet | Inflow: 2\,630.27 CFS

Road shoulders are gone. Ditches are choked. Culverts are buried beneath debris. Water cut holes into roads and stripped soil from the hillsides. A bridge just downstream of the dam is so badly washed out that it will need to be barricaded until engineers determine how to repair it.

It’ll take months for the five-person Stonewall Jackson Lake team to fully recover the facility to pre-flood conditions. Drain ditches and culvert entrances need to be cleared, roadways are washed out and riddled with holes, debris litters walkways and hillsides and the river – virtually everything needs work except the dam. The team starts by fixing damage that could hurt anybody and takes notes on the long-term tasks that will require assessments and meetings.

Later that day, after working for 25 of the last 36 hours, David goes home at 4 p.m.

EARLY MORNING – PITTSBURGH

Volume: 2\,555\,358\,973 cubic feet | Inflow: 2\,248.22 CFS

The next morning is somber.

Matt has worked in the district for five years. Like Jeff, he’s seen high-water events. He’s seen reservoirs reach record pools. He’s never seen a new inflow record. The news detailing the devastation and aftermath is hard to watch. The towns will take months and years to put themselves back together.

Matt is grateful for three things: the storms are over, his family is safe, and the dam captured a lot of water that didn’t add flood volume to downstream towns.

He gets to work on his next unenviable responsibility as part of the district’s water management team: figuring out the safe way to release half a billion cubic feet of new water without hurting downstream towns still grappling with standing water and damage. He knows it will be slow, careful, and precise so the flooding downstream doesn’t worsen.

“But why, after all of that, would Stonewall Jackson Dam release more water?”

The answer is the same reason the Corps of Engineers builds reservoirs in the first place: to reduce flood risk. Stonewall Jackson Dam was ready to catch more than 500 million cubic feet of unpredicted rainfall in less than 12 hours because the dam balances its capacity through deliberate and calculated releases. If a dam keeps levels raised or does not restore storage capacity, it won’t be ready for the next storm.

The job doesn’t belong to just one person, either. Hundreds of people across multiple states work in lockstep to make sure a 16-reservoir system is calibrated and ready for sudden and aggressive storms. The dams save more than property – they save communities, memories, and lives.

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