June 26 2024 – 11:45 hrs.
What happened?
After the intense rains that were recorded in the southern and central part of the country a few days ago, the sector of El Yeso reservoirin the commune of San José de MaipoMetropolitan Region, was completely covered in snow.
This was captured in an impressive recording shown on the morning show “Mucho Gusto”, where you can see the road to the snow-covered reservoirto the point that heavy machinery had to arrive to remove it, despite the sub-zero temperatures in the place.
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As seen in the video, the snow even exceeds the height of the front snow loader machine, so it is easily over 3 meters, thus being called a true “snow wall”according to the journalist specialized in Meteorology, Alejandro Sepúlveda.
“A historic snowfall”: the road to the El Yeso reservoir is closed
Given the amount of snow that was recorded in the place, the road in the Maipo Canyon to climb the El Yeso reservoir It is closed at the height of San Gabriel upwards.
Due to the low temperatures that have been recorded in recent days, the snow has melted little or not at all, so excavator machines hired by him Ministry of Public Works (MOP) They have been working this Wednesday morning to clear the road as soon as possible.
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For now there is no estimate of when more snow could be removed, although no new precipitation is anticipated in the coming days, so it is expected that the road will be opened as soon as possible. “One can measure with this image the history of this snowfall”he assured Karen Doggenweiler.
“As there have been successive snow events, they come one after another, compacting it. Furthermore, with the temperatures below zero in the sector, a block of ice is created that is very compacted“That’s why it takes so long for the machine to remove it,” explained Sepúlveda.
El Yeso reservoir “is at full water”
Alejandro Sepúlveda also assured that “We must monitor the El Yeso reservoir because it is at its maximum water level and it is being evaluated whether a scheduled discharge should be carried out.“.
It should be remembered that the El Yeso reservoir is one of the main sources of drinking water in the Metropolitan Region and that after the recent rains it reached 89% of its capacity. Given this, some water could be discharged into the river of the same name, which then reaches the Maipo River.
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