The World’s

Most Amazing
Dams

Prepared by:
Avance, Saud S.
Ilimin, Anren H.
Ilul, Rajiv M.
Jingkatal, Imran X.
Mohammad, Hamrin T.
Hoover Dam
Nevada/Arizona, United States
This dam was commissioned by President
Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1935 and sits on the
border between Nevada and Arizona. A group of
six companies (dubbed ‘Six Companies’) were
given the task of building the largest concrete
structure in the world at the time. The project
employed thousands of workers during the great
depression, giving many people in the region a
steady job over the course of construction. A lack
of safety procedures and an abundance of
summer heat, however, caused over 100 workers
to perish during the five years it took to complete
the dam.
Three Gorges Dam The original plans for the
Hubei, China
Three Gorges Dam began as early as
1932, but construction on the
project wasn’t begun until 1994.
After completion in 2012, the Three
Gorges Dam took the title of both
the world’s largest power station and
the world’s largest operating
hydroelectric facility in terms of
annual energy generation. The dam
itself is highly controversial, as its
construction displaced over one
million people and flooded
numerous archaeological and
cultural sites.
The Karun-3 Dam
Khuzestan, Iran

This arch style dam stops the Karun

River in Khuzestan, Iran. Built for both flood
control and power generating purposes,
the Karun dam makes up for a large portion
of Iran’s power shortage. The Karun-3 Dam
also boasts the largest reservoir among all
double arc concrete dams in the world.
The Inguri Dam
Jvari, Georgia
Beginning construction in
1961, the Inguri River Dam is world’s
second largest arch dam. Originally,
the dam was set to become
operational in 1978, and did for a
brief time, but it was not fully
completed until 1987. During a dam
inspection in 1994, it was found that
the dam was in extremely poor
condition. Since the initial
inspection, over €116 million have
been spent to bring the dam to
acceptable operating standards.
Vajont
Erto E Casso, Italy
This dam was touted as ‘The Tallest
Dam in the World’ while it was being
constructed, and it still remains one of the
tallest coming it at 860 feet. Although a rather
beautiful structure, this dam has gone unused
since October of 1963. While the lake behind
the dam was being filled, a large landslide
occurred and caused a man-made tsunami
which displaced 50 million cubic feet of water.
This massive wall of water crested at 820 feet
over the top of the dam (almost the height of
the dam itself) and came crashing down onto
the town below. 1,917 people lost their lives in
the resulting flood, and the rest of the reservoir
behind the dam was never filled.
Largest Beaver Dam
Wood Buffalo Park, Canada The dam that tops this list is, well,
cheating. It’s actually a beaver dam, but it’s
more spectacular than any man-made dam
you’ll ever see. In 2007, it was discovered that
a beaver dam in Wood Buffalo National Park,
Canada stretched a whopping 2,790 feet,
creating a massive marshland around it.
Scientists believe that ‘construction’ on this
dam has been going on since 1979, and many
generations of beaver have put effort into
making it the largest beaver dam in the world.
Satellite images from NASA show that there
are two other dams nearby that could, in the
next decade, join together with the existing
dam, making it 50 to 100 meters longer than
it is today.
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