Our nation’s dams provide drinking water, power, flood control, recreation, and many other benefits—but they can also pose significant risks to people living downstream should they fail. If you are a dam owner, dam safety official, lawmaker, or concerned citizen, it's important to know the risks associated with the presence of a dam, how extreme rainfall events affect the risk of dam failure, and how to reduce those risks.

Two e-booklets answer questions about dams:

Living with Dams: Know Your Risks presents factual responses to common myths about dams, descriptions of recent and historical dam failures, suggestions for finding out if a property is in a dam failure inundation zone, and questions for determining a dam's condition and hazard potential.

Living with Dams: Extreme Rainfall Events describes how climate information connects the concepts of rain, floods, dam failure, and flooding downstream. The publication includes resilience-building suggestions for dam owners, policy makers, and downstream communities. It also describes a Hazard Potential Classification System for dams based upon the impact a failure would have on the population and development located downstream.