Gross Reservoir closed to recreation after deadly accident

Gross Reservoir will be closed to recreation for several weeks. This comes after last week's deadly accident at the reservoir's expansion project.     

A dump truck carrying 7,000 pounds of rocks got too close to the edge of the road, the road collapsed, sending the dump truck rolling downhill into the water. The large dump truck loaded with approximately 7000 pounds of rock tumbled over rocks and trees into water about 35 feet deep.

The driver, an engineer with six years of experience, worked for contractor Kiewit Barnard Construction. The vehicle is part of the Gross Reservoir Expansion Project that is being conducted to increase the capacity of the reservoir that supplies Denver Water. The nearly half billion dollar project calls for increasing the capacity of the reservoir by enlarging the dam and raising the potential water level. It is still five years from completion. Current reservoir capacity is about 42,000 acre feet of water. The project will increase that by 77,000 acre feet. (An acre foot is about 326,000 gallons.)

Denver Water said that the first step to removing the equipment from the reservoir is to complete a survey of the area before the truck can be removed with minimal impact to the reservoir.

The closure includes on-water recreation, hiking and picnicking.