LAHORE, March 3: The Mirani Dam project being built on the River Dasht, about 30 miles west of the Turbat city in Makran division of Balochistan, has taken off after some hiccups and 1.6 per cent of work has been completed.

Project authorities told visiting journalists from Lahore that they would create a reservoir of about 152,000 acre feet and irrigate around 32,000 acres in addition to supplying drinking water and recharging sub-soil reservoir. They said the carry-over storage was expected to help boost the present cropping intensity of less than 5 per cent in the command area to 85 per cent (kharif 36 per cent and rabi 49 per cent).

The project, located about 380 miles northeast of Quetta, is being built on the confluence of two rivers —- Kech and Nihang. The River Nihang, originating from Iran and travelling to Pakistan, has a catchment area of 3,669 square miles and annual discharge of around 140,000 cusecs. It touched a peak flood of 325,000 cusecs in March 1998.

Similarly, the catchment area of the River Kech is 4,604 square miles with a peak flood discharge of 140,000 cusecs. The river experienced a discharge of 350,000 cusecs in March 1998.

The main objectives of the project are irrigation of about 33,200 acres, protection from flood, developing fisheries and promotion of livestock in the area.

Project contractors —- the Mirani Dam Joint Venture led by DESCON Engineering Company —- are constructing site offices, a dispensary, a 40-kilometre road from Turbat to the Mirani Dam site besides conducting ground quality surveys, drilling at different places and marking for project boundaries.

The gross storage of the dam is 302,000 acre feet, while the live storage capacity of the reservoir is 152,000 acre feet. The normal reservoir level is 244 feet and the maximum level is 276.2 feet.

The project is a concrete face rock fill dam with a maximum height of 127 feet, 3,350 feet of length at crest and 35 feet width. The spillways of the dam is of overflow (un-gated) type and dam’s outlet is an eight-foot tunnel with a capacity of 377 cusecs.

The total command area of the dam will be 20,800 acres at right bank and 12,400 acres at left bank. The capacity of Right Bank Canal is 236 cusecs and Left Bank Canal 141 cusecs.

The total land affected by the dam is about 16,000 acres and will displace about 200 people. The dam will be completed on June 30, 2006.