Officials worried earthen dam in desert could fail and flood village

PHOENIX» An earthen dam in Arizona’s southern desert could fail and flood a small village because the lake behind it is swollen with runoff from the remnants of Tropical Storm Rosa, officials announced Wednesday.

Ali Chuk, an American Indian community with 162 people on the Tohono O’odham Nation reservation, was evacuated Tuesday night, the tribe’s public safety department said in a news release. No further details were available Wednesday on the evacuations. Tribal officials planned to inspect the dam and lake by helicopter.

Water levels were within a foot (0.3 meters) of topping Menagers Dam, which could give way and flood Ali Chuk, the National Weather Service said.

The area near the U.S.Mexico border received 3 to 5 inches of rain Tuesday. Flooding from runoff made roads there impassable.

There were no reports Wednesday of additional rain.

The tribal safety department said 30 people had been evacuated from another village on the reservation because of flooding.

Elsewhere in Arizona, forecasters warned of more possible flooding in Phoenix and other areas.

The weather service said up to 1 inch of rain had fallen in parts of Maricopa County, which includes Phoenix, and that flash flooding was expected.

A separate flash flood warning was issued for Yavapai County north of Phoenix because of high water in a creek in Cornville and for a small part of the Tohono O’odham Nation’s reservation in Pima County in southern Arizona.

The weather service said a whopping record 2.35 inches of rain had fallen at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport as of Tuesday night.

That made it the rainiest October day since rainfall records have been kept, topping the 2.32 inches recorded on Oct. 14, 1988.

It also marked the eighthrainiest day in Phoenix history for any date.

The storm was also expected to eventually dump rain on Utah and Colorado.