Explain how you can estimate the volume of the lake and its surface area:

The surface area of the lake was shown on the Wikipedia website that was given to us as a source to help complete this task. SA = 9.94 . For the volume, I am assuming that the base of the lake is the same as the surface which will make it become a prism. With it being a prism I can use the formula: Volume = (area of base) (height) —> obviously this being a lake I would have to substitute the height with the average depth which was also given on the Wikipedia source —> Volume = (9.94 ) (119m)

How much water does the barrier contain in the lake?

So in order for me to determine how much water there is I need to use the formula for volume that I stated previously, Volume = (area of base) (depth), but before I use that I converted the of the surface area to to make everything more organized. After using this formula my product will be converted to which does not correspond with liquids, so I will have to convert into liters (L).

If the barrier faulted, what do you thing would happen? Consider; how much water would escape, and what kind of power is the escaping water equivalent to?

If the barrier were to crumble, the water would come down towards the town of Squamish and flood the area. As well as destroy everything standing between the barrier and the town, all the trees and the Squamish rivers will be ruined. Not all the water on the lake would escape because the bottom of the lake is not a flat surface, it has some deeper areas as shown on the Wikipedia site. However most of the water will still come out and do a lot of damage. If we assume that the water of the lake is 4 degrees Celsius then 1 will be equal to 1000kg, when I converted the number of cubic meters in the lake into kg, I got 1 182 860 000 000kg. The power of all that weight of water is insanely high and would easily squish anything that stands in its way. A professor named Dr. Quane researched about this topic and has confirmed that Squamish would be completely demolished if the barrier were to break. He also stated “The potential energy at 1,400 meters elevation, of 1 trillion liters of water, is 200 times the energy released by the bomb on Hiroshima”.

This assignment was very different to what I am used to doing, the idea of measuring the volume of a lake has never come across my mind before. The estimation I made shocked me because of how much water there really was and got me to think if my estimation was close. Also this made me wonder how much water there actually is in the lake. In conclusion, this assignment very interesting and odd but helped me learn more about volume which is good.

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garibaldi_Lake

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Barrier

http://www.squamishchief.com/news/garibaldi-lake-a-ticking-time-bomb-1.1753732

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_much_does_a_cubic_meter_of_water_weigh#ixzz1Pr8RphSu