http://www.aljazeera.com/amp/indepth/fea...6082852394.html

It was built on unstable ground, maintenance was neglected, and if more then 1/4 of it goes; Mosul will get hit with a 25 meter wall of water en route to Bahdad. A real expensive example of the old adage "I ******* told you so!"

Well the US infrastructure is also neglected and decaying... (http://www.infrastructurereportcard.org/)

Lots of possible future issues can be seen way in advance. However resources, money, time, priorities causes other choices to be made. This is not only in Iraq, but happens all over the world, rich or poor.

Haven't you heard? Both major candidates proposed major infrastructure repair programs to improve the situation and provide employment.

What could possibly go wrong????

(just a wee bit if sarcasm....)

Sorry for going slightly off topic, and I hate to be a nit picker, but have all news organizations stopped proof reading? Note, from the story:

"In a communique released in March, the US embassy in Baghdad said that between 500,000 million and 1.47 million Iraqis living along the Tigris river "probably would not survive".

"500,000 million"? Really? 500,000,000,000 people? 500 Billion? There are only about 7.5 billion on earth. . .

The requirements for a journalist to know how to correctly spell and speak accurately was dropped long, long ago.

Among other skills.

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But, this is a pattern I keep seeing time and time again. It's gotten to the point where it's so common that I gave it a name. I call it the "Yertle the Turtle Syndrome"

Peerless leader/ hot stuff business magnate / performer ignores recommendations to NOT do something. Either build in area vulnerable to flooding/landslides/other large scale disaster/etc, or do something inadvis

Shortcuts are made during construction, recommendations are ignored, inspection results are either ignored or inspections were not made.

Property is not regularly maintained and inspected, and often used for something other then the original purpose.

The first time anything goes wrong, the whole thing comes down in a big, expensive, and often deadly, pile.

EDIT: I think this is an argument for doing your own risk assessments and not relying on the reassurances of the powers that be.

Of course, when zoning laws and building standards are properly applied, we hear of "burdensome regulations," "nanny state." and all of that. It mightily depends upon whose ox is being gored.

It seems to me that much of our infrastructure is holding up decently, at least serving through its predictable lifetime, and represents competent work. Maintenance of anything more complex that a compost pile is to be expected, and must be planned and budgeted for.

Come to think of it, probably even compost piles need maintenance, but I never took that course...

Maintaining compost piles is a rotten job if ever there was one!

Compost piles do need maintenance...they are subject to spontaneous combustion. In our county, a huge compost pile caught fire and it took more than 90 firefighters from 3 counties and Baltimore City over a day to put it out!

Re the OP: Political minefield, this.

I will tiptoe this far: the bad engineering on the Mosul dam from the get-go (incompatible substrate) has been long documented. The administration that built it spent fortunes on grouting patches to keep it from failing. The shift to a new administration did not change the problem -- they kept patching vigorously, for the reasons noted by the OP. The ongoing political/military instability in this area caused the patching to cease; it was too unsafe for workers to continue. And here we are, hoping for the best and fearing the worst for the civilians downstream.

How's that? Did I step around the boom-booms?

Must be a slow news month as the Mosul Dam problems are nothing new.

I read about this back in April of this year.

A decade ago our team was pressure grouting the dam around the clock. It was not comforting thought that if it failed our POS would be inundated. Fortunately the mortars and rockets kept our mind off of such ponderings most of the time.

That's #3 on my list of "43,000 Reasons to not live in or near Mosul"