Thread by @Charlesrei1

The Nova Kakhovka dam, a thread:
The dam failed. The question is not about responsibility, either proximate/direct cause or main contributing cause. The Ukrainians have no purpose, incentive, nor arguably the ability to cause or allow this to happen. The question is how. 1/13

Given: This is a humanitarian and environmental disaster affecting this region of Ukraine and its people for years to come. This includes the loss of a major water supply to Crimea due to the resulting drop in the reservoir level. 2/13
Graphic: BBC

Flooding will primarily affect the left bank of the river, the Russian occupied side. But both sides are forced to evacuate civilians and soldiers. 3/13

https://twitter.com/visegrad24/status/1666024798776967170?s=20

Did Russia blow it up? It doesn't look like it. Images from this morning show the damage fairly close up. There are no indications of demolition or explosives at the point of failure. There are clear signs of structural collapse of the dam facilities. 4/13

https://twitter.com/Osinttechnical/status/1665924031520882688?s=20

Are there signs of explosive damage elsewhere on the dam? Yes. The far northern spans of the roadway were blown by retreating Russians last fall. With some assumed damage to the gates below them. 5/13

https://twitter.com/Liveuamap/status/1665937703798558722?s=20

There are also signs of damage to the far southern end of the dam complex, around the lock. This was where Ukrainian artillery worked to interdict Russian bridging operations prior to the Kherson counter- offensive. But the dam did not fail in these spots. 6/13

Who controlled the dam? Well, neither side really. Even if the dam was in working order for river control technically, one side of the shore was controlled by Ukrainian forces, the other by the Russians. The control houses are on the Russian bank. 7/13

But their ability to manage or maintain the dam in such a grey area is questionable even if they had wanted to. This is where we need to go back in time to look at the management of the river. 8/13

There were changes in the level of the reservoir in the last month, but the trend since early April has been in one direction... up. Causing the reservoir to over-top the dam gates over the past weeks. 9/13

https://twitter.com/davidhelms570/status/1663569718496620544?s=20

And this spill over is where the dam failure is today. Was it planned? Dunno. Is it negligence or technical failure? Dunno. Is there the possibility of explosive evidence underwater? The Ukrainian government is treating it as such. 10/13

https://twitter.com/Info_Rosalie/status/1665947881508057090?s=20

What is the military impact? It depends. Bridging or rafting the Dnipro both across the reservoir and down stream was extremely difficult before. Now technologically impossible. 11/13
(This was under controlled training conditions)
defence-blog.com/ukrainian-mili…

It has greater effect that the roadway and crossing the dam provided is gone. This may have an effect on AFU offensive operations depending on how they envisioned this segment of the line in their overall concept. The left bank was defended only enough to prevent crossing. 12/13

So... to summarize. It's seems more likely that it failed than was blown. Everyone loses from this disaster. The likelihood of AFU crossing the Dnipro went from slim to none. Information battles have started. And no the ZNPP is not in danger. 13/13

https://twitter.com/iaeaorg/status/1665956258317496323?s=20