Carr Creek Lake (formerly Carr Fork Lake), located east of
Hazard, Kentucky
Hazard is a home rule-class city in, and the county seat of, Perry County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 5,263 at the 2020 census.
History
Local landowner Elijah Combs Sr. laid out the town in 1824 as the planned seat of the ...
, along
Kentucky Route 15
Kentucky Route 15 begins at a junction of US 119/ Corridor F & Business KY 15 in Whitesburg, and terminates in Winchester at US 60. It is a major route, connecting the coalfields of the Cumberland Plateau with Lexington and other cities in th ...
in
Knott County, is a
reservoir
A reservoir (; ) is an enlarged lake behind a dam, usually built to water storage, store fresh water, often doubling for hydroelectric power generation.
Reservoirs are created by controlling a watercourse that drains an existing body of wa ...
created by the
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
The United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) is the military engineering branch of the United States Army. A direct reporting unit (DRU), it has three primary mission areas: Engineer Regiment, military construction, and civil wor ...
in 1976.
Carr Creek Lake's earth and rock fill
dam
A dam is a barrier that stops or restricts the flow of surface water or underground streams. Reservoirs created by dams not only suppress floods but also provide water for activities such as irrigation, human consumption, industrial use, aqua ...
is
130 ft (40 m) tall and 720 ft (219 m) long, and the dam is located 8.8 mi (14 km) above the mouth of Carr Fork River, a tributary of the
North Fork Kentucky River
North Fork Kentucky River is a river in Kentucky in the United States.
It is a fork of the Kentucky River that it joins just upstream of Beattyville.
It is nearly long with an average slope of , and an overall basin size (at Jackson) of
Basin ...
.
The lake is the main attraction of
Carr Creek State Park
Carr Creek State Park is a park located along Kentucky Route 15 in Knott County, Kentucky, United States
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North Ameri ...
.
The emergency spillway of the dam exposes many layers of the underlying rock, showing the geological history of the area back to the
Pennsylvanian Period
The Pennsylvanian ( , also known as Upper Carboniferous or Late Carboniferous) is, on the ICS geologic timescale, the younger of two subperiods of the Carboniferous Period (or the upper of two subsystems of the Carboniferous System). It last ...
.
References
External links
Recreation.gov - Carr Creek LakeCarr Creek State Park facilities map
1976 establishments in Kentucky
Protected areas of Knott County, Kentucky
Reservoirs in Kentucky
Bodies of water of Knott County, Kentucky
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