Elwha Stories

Video of the Elwha River restoration, from a drone's-eye-view.

Elwha River restoration, from a drone's-eye view.

In these images from the National Park Service webcam aimed at the site of the Elwha Dam, the 99-year-old dam is shown just before dismantling began in September 2011. At right is the site with a free-flowing Elwha River refinding the canyon that the dam plugged.

If you haven't already, check out our documentary Undamming the Elwha.

The Elwha Dam sites are going to offer whitewater enthusiasts the opportunity for some great boating!!!  (Photo:  Taken between Altaire Campground and Hwy 101)

Mike McHenry, fisheries habitat biologist with the Lower Elwha Klallam tribe at the four-day Elwha River Science Symposium.

Rachel Hagaman of the Lower Elwha Klallam tribe places two king salmon on a bed of cedar boughs during a traditional ceremony to welcome the salmon back to the Elwha River. -- Photo by Arwyn Rice/Peninsula Daily News

But with the river’s restoration — or redemption, as some fervent supporters of the $325 million project put it — has come a mind-bogglingly large surge of sediment. More than 24 million cubic yards of silt, sand, clay and rock — enough to fill the area of a football field to a depth of 2.2 miles, according to the United States Geological Survey — accumulated behind the dams, much of it the detritus of glaciers.

The Glines Canyon Dam coming down on the Elwha River.

From our Facebook page: Here's a cool photo from the Elwha, where dam removal is changing one lake to a river, once again.