geosciences Communication Insights into the Oroville Dam 2017 Spillway Incident Aristotelis Koskinas 1, Aristoteles Tegos 1,2,*, Penelope Tsira 1, Panayiotis Dimitriadis 1 , Theano Iliopoulou 1, Panos Papanicolaou 1, Demetris Koutsoyiannis 1 and Tracey Williamson 3 1 Department of Water Resources and Environmental Engineering, National Technical University of Athens, Heroon Polytechniou 9, Zografou, GR-15780 Zographou Athens, Greece;
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[email protected] Received: 9 December 2018; Accepted: 7 January 2019; Published: 11 January 2019 Abstract: In February 2017, a failure occurring in Oroville Dam’s main spillway risked causing severe damages downstream. A unique aspect of this incident was the fact that it happened during a flood scenario well within its design and operational procedures, prompting research into its causes and determining methods to prevent similar events from reoccurring. In this study, a hydroclimatic analysis of Oroville Dam’s catchment is conducted, along with a review of related design and operational manuals. The data available allows for the comparison of older flood-frequency analyses to new alternative methods proposed in this paper and relevant literature. Based on summary characteristics