New Caoling Lake ( zh, t=新草嶺潭, p=Xīn Cǎolǐng Tán)The name "Caoling Lake" typically refers to all four instances of this lake, while "New Caoling Lake" only refers to the 1999-2004 lake. was a short-lived barrier lake on the border of Gukeng,

Yunlin County Yunlin County (Mandarin pinyin: ''Yúnlín Xiàn''; Taigi POJ: ''Hûn-lîm-koān''; Hakka PFS: ''Yùn-lìm-yen'') is a county in western Taiwan. Yunlin County borders the Taiwan Strait to the west, Nantou County to the east, Changhua County t ...

and

Meishan Meishan (; Sichuanese Pinyin: Mi2san1; local pronunciation: ; ), formerly known as Meizhou () or Qingzhou (), is a prefecture-level city with 2,955,219 inhabitants as of 2020 census whom 1,232,648 lived in the built-up (or metro) area made of th ...

Chiayi County Chiayi County (Mandarin pinyin: ''jiā yì xiàn''; Hokkien POJ: ''Ka-gī-koān'') is a county in southwestern Taiwan surrounding but not including Chiayi City. It is the sixth largest county in Taiwan. Name The former Chinese placename was ...

, near the village of

Caoling Caoling () is a rural village in Gukeng Township, Yunlin County, Taiwan. It is to above sea level. The area measures approximately one thousand hectares. Mountains around Caoling are prone to landslides, and four barrier lakes have formed ar ...

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

. Located on the Qingshui River, a tributary of the

Zhuoshui River The Zhuoshui River, also spelled Choshui or Jhuoshuei River, () is the longest river in Taiwan. It flows from its source in Nantou County up to the western border of the county, subsequently forming the border between Yunlin County and Changhua ...

, the lake formed due to a landslide during the

1999 Jiji earthquake The Chi-Chi earthquake (later also known as the Jiji earthquake) (), also known as the great earthquake of September 21 (), was a 7.3 ML or 7.7 Mw earthquake which occurred in Jiji (Chi-Chi), Nantou County, Taiwan on Tuesday, 21 Se ...

on September 21, 1999. The lake disappeared during a flood caused by Typhoon Mindulle in July 2004.

Past lakes

The area around

is mountainous and prone to landslides. Historically, there have been four instances of barrier lakes forming in this area. The first recorded instance was during the 1862 Tainan earthquake, which lasted until 1898. During the 1941 Chungpu earthquake, a landslide formed a 70 m tall dam; in 1942, another landslide caused the dam to grow to 170 m tall. On 18 May 1951, the dam abruptly failed, killing hundreds of people downstream, including 74 soldiers constructing a road up to the lake. On 15 August 1979, a landslide caused by 1979 typhoons caused a lake to form, which failed on 24 August the same year.

History

During the

on September 21, 1999, a landslide west of Caoling formed a 50 m tall barrier that once again dammed up the Qingshui River. After the earthquake, the

Water Resources Agency The Water Resources Agency (WRA; ) is the administrative agency of the Ministry of Economic Affairs of the Taiwan (ROC) responsible for water-related affairs. History The creation of Water Resources Agency dated back in 1946 under the Ministry ...

announced that the lake's dam was stable and the newly formed lake could potentially be used as a

reservoir A reservoir (; from French ''réservoir'' ) is an enlarged lake behind a dam. Such a dam may be either artificial, built to store fresh water or it may be a natural formation. Reservoirs can be created in a number of ways, including contro ...

and serve as a substitute for

Shigang Dam Shihgang Dam () is a concrete gravity barrage dam across the Dajia River in Shigang District and Dongshi District of Taichung, Taiwan, located near Fengyuan District. The dam was built from 1974 to 1977 for flood control and irrigation purposes, ...

, which was damaged in the earthquake. However, this plan was never carried out. Though the lake covered over some of Caoling's scenic attractions, the new lake was still popular among tourists. However, the lake was short-lived as

sedimentation Sedimentation is the deposition of sediments. It takes place when particles in suspension settle out of the fluid in which they are entrained and come to rest against a barrier. This is due to their motion through the fluid in response to the ...

gradually raised the lake's floor. Also, water channels formed on the dam, which decreased the

retention time In chemical analysis, chromatography is a laboratory technique for the separation of a mixture into its components. The mixture is dissolved in a fluid solvent (gas or liquid) called the ''mobile phase'', which carries it through a system (a ...

of the water. In July 2004, a flood caused by Typhoon Mindulle (known as the Seven-Two Flood) raised the lake's surface above the dam, washing away the barrier and returning the river to its original state.

References

Notes

{{reflist, group="Note" Landslide-dammed lakes Lakes of Taiwan Landforms of Yunlin County Landforms of Chiayi County