sltrib.com
Big cracks are forming in the floor of Cedar Valley. They’ve already undermined one unfinished subdivision north of Enoch, and they’re still growing. One is 2.4 miles long. If unchecked, they could threaten Enoch itself, not to mention local roads and buried utility lines.
This is not a Halloween story, or the movie “Tremors.” It’s scarier, in fact, because it’s real. Fortunately, the Utah Geological Survey knows what the cause is, and if the people who pump water from the many wells in the area can cooperate, the problem is fixable. But a solution will require both community spirit and self-sacrifice, because people will have to use less water.
Since 1939, according to the UGS report, more water has been taken from the aquifer below Cedar Valley than Mother Nature has funneled back in. The water table has dropped by as much as 114 feet. This has caused the underground sediments in the aquifer to compact. The fissures and sinkholes visible on the surface of the ground are evidence of subsidence, that is, ground settling. The ground has sunk by as much as four feet over a broad area of Cedar Valley.
This settling has caused about 4 miles of cracks or fissures in the ground, particularly in the area of Enoch (north of Cedar City) and around Quichapa Lake. There may be other fissures that are not yet visible.
A new interactive map of Snake Valley with all of the well data, has recently been added to the Utah Geological Survey (UGS) Web site. The West Desert Ground-Water Monitoring Network is almost complete and updates are available on a newly developed Google Earth™ interactive map. The network will monitor ground water for more than 50 years in Snake Valley, western Millard County and adjacent areas. The $3.5 million network is a response to planned ground-water development in east-central Nevada. The Utah Geological Survey will upload data onto its Web site.