Information that you can use:
  • 110 tunnels and shafts were created for a total of 7 miles
  • Spillways large enough to float the largest battleship
  • Each intake Tower is as high as a 34-story building
  • When filled, Lake Mead is  585 feet deep and 115 miles long
  • When filled, the lake has enough water to cover Connecticut 10 feet deep
  • 29 miles of railroad tracks were laid to send supplies to various sites
  • Over 5000 workers were employed during the construction process
  • The "Hard Hat" was invented by resourceful workers working on the dam floor
  • No worker is buried in the dam concrete
  • Power used by:
    56% California
    25% Nevada
    19% Arizona

  • Lake Mead

  • 6.5 years to fill (A slow filling process was required to lessen the pressure change on the dam and to help prevent small earthquakes due to land settlement.)

  • 589 feet (181 m) at the deepest point247 square miles in size

  • 110 miles (176 km) long

  • Named after Dr. Elwood Mead, Commissioner of the Bureau of Reclamation (1924 - 1936)

  • Largest man made reservoir in the United States
  • Spillway House
             NEW: The Hoover Dam Multi-Use Green Building
             Spillway House is presently under construction
             near the Nevada Spillway.
             Please take care when walking near the worksite.

Location: Arizona and Nevada, USA
Completion Date: 1936
Cost: $165 million
Reservoir Capacity: 1.24 trillion cubic feet
Type: Arch/ Gravity
Purpose: Hydroelectric power/flood control
Reservoir: Lake Mead
Materials: Concrete
Engineers: Bureau of Reclamation


The Hoover Dam is a curved gravity dam. Lake Mead pushes against the dam, creating compressive forces that travel along the great curved wall. The canyon walls push back, counteracting these forces. This action squeezes the concrete in the arch together, making the dam very rigid. This way, Lake Mead can't push it over.

Today, the Hoover Dam is the second highest dam in the country and the 18th highest in the world. It generates more than four billion kilowatt-hours a year,  that's enough to serve 1.3 million people!

Fast Facts:
  • At its base, Hoover Dam is as thick (660 feet) as two footballs fields measured end to end. It is 1244 feet across, 45 feet  thick at the top, and is 726 feet tall. That's almost 200 feet taller than the Washington Monument in Washington, D.C.
  • During peak periods of electrical demands, enough water runs through the generators to fill 15 average-size swimming pools (20,000 gallons each) in one second.
  • There is enough concrete in Hoover Dam (4.5 million cubic yards) to build a two-lane road from Seattle, Washington, to Miami, Florida, or a four-foot-wide sidewalk around the Earth at the Equator.
  • The Hoover Dam is so thick and heavy, it doesn't even need to be curved! It's heavy enough to resist the weight and thrust of the water pushing behind it, but designers thought people would feel safer with a curved design.
  • $165 million dollars to build
    4.5 years to build
    4.4 million yards of concrete used for construction
    March 1931 building began
    September 30, 1935 President Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated the completed dam
  • Powerhouse
    17 generators
    4 billion kilowatt hours produced each year
    10 acres of floor space