The collapse of the Nova Kakhovka Dam along the Dnipro River has become one of the largest industrial and ecological disasters in Europe, destroying cities, villages, and farms, depriving people of power and clean water, and causing massive environmental damage and a possible nuclear meltdown.
With the public information being provided, there is still no concrete reason why the dam failed, as the dam and hydroelectric power plant are currently under Russian control and inaccessible to independent investigators.
As a result, Western officials have blamed Russia for the destruction of the dam and played a part in the displacement of both Ukrainian civilians and Russian military positions downstream.
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said while they could not independently verify the cause of the dam's destruction, it was "another devastating consequence of the Russian invasion of Ukraine."
However, engineering experts speculated that, among the countless possibilities, an explosion was the most likely cause of the dam failure.
A CNN article provided several theories about the collapse of the dam and what experts say about each of them.
Russian Sabotage
The Ukrainian government quickly blamed Moscow for the incident, saying the Russians blew up the reservoir from the inside. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky cited its own intelligence reports from 2022, claiming the Russians mined the dam. Several social media posts indicate people heard the explosions around the time the dam was thought to have been damaged.
The Russian sabotage theory would make sense as the Ukrainians are preparing to launch its counter-offensive, which Zelensky and his government are tight-lipped about. Another reason for the theory's plausibility was due to the Ukrainian recapture of Kherson in November 2022, which is the first major city along the Dnipro's banks after the dam.
Ukrainian presidential aide Mykhailo Podolyak said the Russian's "obvious" goal was to stall the Ukrainian counter-offensive by making it difficult for them to cross the Dnipro. "This once again confirms that the Kremlin is not thinking strategically, but rather in terms of short-term situational advantages. But the consequences are already catastrophic," he added.
According to the Ukrainian Agricultural Ministry, the dam breach also resulted in the fall of water levels in the reservoir, affecting 94% of irrigation systems in Kherson, 74% in Zaporizhzhya, and 30% in Dnipro oblasts "without a source of water."
The Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant also depends on the dam's reservoir as it supplies cooling water to Europe's largest nuclear power station. Any bad move to the plant would trigger a repeat of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986.
Ukrainian Artillery
On the other hand, Russia has denied any involvement in the incident and blamed Ukraine for destroying the dam. However, the Kremlin has not provided any evidence aside from saying the Ukrainians launched "mass artillery attacks" on the dam.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov claimed the attack was "planned and carried out by order received from Kyiv, from the Kyiv regime," to "deprive Crimea of water," and to distract from the battlefield. Consequently, Ukraine denied such accusations.
University of Exeter Tidal Engineering and Environmental Services chair Chris Binnie said the theory of Ukraine targeting the dam was "highly unlikely" as it would need to get "massive explosives close to the foundations."
Meanwhile, HR Wallingford technical director Craig Goff said inflicting enough damage on the dam would require a very precise strike, similar to the actions of the Royal Air Force Dambusters back in World War II.
"It wasn't a simple thing," he explained. "You had to get the explosives right down on the upstream side of the dam at a deep depth. If it was just the top of the dam then it would probably still survive. You'd lose a bit of water but it would survive."
Another consequence of the dam failure was Crimea's water security.
When Crimea was annexed by Russia in 2014, Kyiv quickly blocked the North Crimea Canal to deprive the peninsula of water. The Russians reopened the canal when they captured the dam during the first days of their invasion in 2022.
The destruction of the dam did not only affect the villages downstream but also the people of Crimea, as their source of water would slowly deplete again.
However, some suggested the dam burst also surprised several Russian units as much as the Ukrainians, with reports of Russian soldiers being swept up in flood waters and leaving the east bank of the Dnipro.
Structural Failure
The 35m high, 85m long Nova Kakhovka Dam is the last of six Soviet-era dams that tame the Dnipro before emptying into the Black Sea. As it was an old facility, there are speculations the dam failure was a technical one and not caused by any of the belligerents.
Goff explained that the dam was of the gravity type, the most commonly constructed across the world. "They've been built for hundreds of years, and if they were designed and built well and are maintained adequately, then the chance of a failure is very, very low," he said. "It would be extremely unusual for this type of dam to fail with no warning."
There is very little information on how the dam was maintained under Russian occupation, as the area surrounding the dam has been the most heavily-contested region since the start of the invasion.
Satellite images taken by Maxar suggested the road above the dam was damaged on June 5, just days before the structural collapse. The last time the bridge was intact was May 28, meaning the bridge was probably damaged between June 1 and 2.
Additionally, NORSAR, an independent Norwegian firm detecting earthquakes and nuclear explosions, spotted an explosion at the dam around the time of the first reports of its collapse on June 6.
NORSAR CEO Anne Lycke said they quickly noticed "there had been an explosion close to the dam or at the dam."
Another speculation of a technical failure included a possible failure inside the power plant. Goff referred to the 2009 explosion at the Sayano-Shushenskaya station, the largest hydroelectric plant in Russia, saying the problem which caused the explosion was "one of its turbines." "[T]hat killed people inside the powerhouse, but it didn't affect the dam in that instance because of the way the dam was built," he said.
Related Article: Zelensky Visits Kherson After Dam Bust, Calls for International Aid
