My new well water level dropped 140' in 4 years!

I put in a well 4 years ago that produced 55gpm at 70psi. Last week I notic= ed the water pressure was fluctuating. I had the well drillers measure the = water depth and it had dropped 140' from where it was. Has anyone heard of = this drastic water table change before? Is it possible my well collapsed? I= am in northern CA. Steve

Reply to
Steve
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the water pressure was fluctuating. I had the well drillers measure the water depth and it had dropped 140' from where it was. Has anyone heard of this drastic water table change before? Is it possible my well collapsed? I am in northern CA.

They may have dug a mine or some other deep structure nearby that hits the same vein of water. It's all being dumped into that place instead. You need to find out who and where and sue the pants off of them.

Reply to
fred.flintstone

"Steve" wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@googlegroups.com...

Reply to
Robert Green

iced the water pressure was fluctuating. I had the well drillers measure th= e water depth and it had dropped 140' from where it was. Has anyone heard o= f this drastic water table change before? Is it possible my well collapsed?= I am in northern CA.

Sounds like you need to investigate other developments in your area and see how many *other* houses/buildings have installed new wells in the past four years which may be depleting the aquifer in your immediate area...

The well drilling company is not going to know that information unless they are the ONLY company in your entire area and install and maintain ALL of the wells...

Sounds like a trip to your local water board or resources authority is in order so you can inquire about such recent developments and report your findings of a 140' drop in the water level of your well in four years time... Someone else may have sunk a deep well causing your problem or there may be too many wells...

Reply to
Evan

This may be the indication of *THE END*......... The world is supposed to end in December, so it may be because we all run out of water!!!!

Of course there is one good thing about all of this. Whoever wins the election in November wont ever get into office!!!! A good reason not to waste your time and gas going to the polling place to vote.

Reply to
fred.flintstone

wrote

Here in California we're getting plenty of rainfall. True, it's down a bit this year, but it's nowhere near drought conditions. In fact, our Hetch Hetchy reservoir in the Sierras is doing quite nicely, thank you. As for water tables, we haven't seen any appreciable change.

If it's the end of the world, nobody's told us about it yet. Oh, the temperature in SF right now is 67 under sunny skies. God is blessing us heathens once again.

Reply to
David Kaye

the water pressure was fluctuating. I had the well drillers measure the water depth and it had dropped 140' from where it was. Has anyone heard of this drastic water table change before? Is it possible my well collapsed? I am in northern CA.

Sure. Wells even go dry around here. The various irrigation companies have been badgered and sued and who knows what by the environmentalists about how much water they draw from local rivers. Most of them are replacing the canals with pipe.

The pipe stop the water leaking from the canals and eventually the companies may leave more water in the rivers.

However, many wells within a mile or so from the canal have gone dry. They were drilled into seepage from the canal, not the water bearing formations. Lots of law suits, but no joy! All wells have to be drilled much deeper and into the water bearing strata.

Our rental property in Redmond, Oregon has a 350 ft. well. Our home well

15 miles North is 650 ft. deep. Wells East of Bend Oregon are up to 900 ft deep.

So, where are you exactly in Northern California? Any irrigation districts in your area?

Paul

Reply to
Paul Drahn

Assuming, of course, that they are complete idiots and that have no clue what the competition is up to.

Reply to
DerbyDad03

"Oren" wrote

We're not demanding water from Nevada; maybe Los Angeles is because they're sharing Colorado River water. But here in heathen San Francisco, our water comes from the Hetch Hetchy valley of Yosemite. Across the bay in socialist Berkeley, their water comes from the Mokelumne, which is a bit to the north also in Yosemite.

Interesting notes about the Hetch Hetchy: (1) the water is so pure it is one of the few municipal water supplies that the EPA does not require to be filtered, (2) it was a socialist water system at a time when nearly all water services were private companies. As such, there was more government money spent to do it RIGHT than what a private company would have spent. (3) The system is entirely gravity-fed requiring NO pumping stations in the

200 mile length of the system from Yosemite to San Francisco. (4) Hetch Hetchy also provides extremely low-cost power to governments and some businesses and households. Where I live we have Hetch Hetchy low-cost power.

The Hetch Hetchy is an engineering miracle that only socialist planners could have done because private industry is too damned cheap to do anything but the minimum required to satisfy their stockholders.

Reply to
David Kaye

Just like the governments interstate highway system where the bridges and roads are all falling apart decades before they should have needed repairs? In that case the politicians did their best to pander to the voters. If they had enough funding to build 100 miles of road they just spread it out a little thinner and impressed everyone with 125 miles of roadway.

Reply to
George

iced the water pressure was fluctuating. I had the well drillers measure th= e water depth and it had dropped 140' from where it was. Has anyone heard o= f this drastic water table change before? Is it possible my well collapsed?= I am in northern CA.

any earthquakes in area recently?

in any case how much will a new deeper well cost?

no matter the actual cause you need a new well:(

Reply to
bob haller

LOL. Another Evan classic. It would take a hell of a lot of new wells in an area for that to be the cause of the drop in water of 140 ft in

4 years. Or some MAJOR new wells, ie municipal ones. In my world, the well drillers would know if that was the cause. After all, it's their business. At least the well drillers I'd be dealing with. Also, typically they service more than one well and if the water table has dropped 140 ft in an area, they would be getting a lot of calls for the same thing.

In my world, someone else drilling a new well doesn't cause a 140 ft drop in my well. Unless maybe the well is right next door and is a major municipal one. In which case you would think you would know it went in. Asking neighbors who have similar wells if they have any problems would be a good idea.

What's that well used for? 55GPM is a lot more than the typical residential well.

Reply to
trader4

+1 In my world my aquafer has a refresh rate of 1.5 million gallons per day. If the OP's well did drop that much in that length of time I would guess his well is either not in an aquafer or there was a major ground fault event, which would be well known to all who use it.
Reply to
Red

The guy is living in a dream. CA is a freaking nightmare! This from a native who moved out 5 yrs ago, after my last 35 yrs in the SFBA. Couldn't get me back there at gunpoint! My two closest friends back there will be gone by next yr.

There's been water wars in CA since the first settlers, since the goldrush. First too much wter, then too little water. The biggest water ware is Norcal against Socal and has been for 50 yrs. Norcal gots it, Socal wants it. NV and AZ are small potatoes in comparison, though still active hard fought fronts. It's gonna get worse.

The only thing I miss about CA is sitting on the beach and looking out over the ocean, sipping some wine, and nibbling some cheese n' bread. Even that exists only in my memories. CA, the reality, is a car clogged Hell!

nb

Reply to
notbob

Anywhere near McCloud?

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The website is out of date, but the problems remain.

nb

Reply to
notbob

I know of a few instances where folks had to have wells re drilled because the first one did not access an adequate aquifer.

Reply to
George

Which God are you referring to? They all have a different agenda!

Reply to
fred.flintstone

I find myself to be polyatheistic. There are a whole bunch of gods I don't believe in.

Reply to
Kurt Ullman

Things the well company would NOT be aware of would be developments where water shedding has been diverted or is being collected for some purpose and the aquifer is thus not being replenished at a rate which can sustain the normal level of the water table...

Another thing a well company would have ZERO clue about would be a construction project which has penetrated the water retaining layers of soil in the OP's general area and the water level is lowered due to the leakage of the aquifer due to the disruption of the those layers...

Another classic trader bullshit reply... Not even knowing where the OP is located or how many other people are in the same aquifer as the OP and assumes that his knowledge of hydrology and geoscience is superior to everyone else's when he has ZERO knowledge of the site conditions or the number of customers who might be calling the well drilling companies to complain -- the OP might just be in an unlucky location where the natural underground flow of water has been blocked or disrupted for a vast number of causes, he doesn't know, apparently the well company doesn't know so some research has to be done to attempt to find the cause of the drop in the level of the well, your assumptions aside, YOU don't know anything beyond what the OP has stated and there are not anything which could be described as proper facts given to be able to so conclusively state anything in the manner you have done here...

Reply to
Evan

Things which Evan would not be aware of:

Aquifers are something well drillers are VERY aware of. It's there business, because, well, that's where the water is. And acquifers typically cover large areas. You don't just drop the level of water in an acquifer

140ft in one localized spot. And you don't drop it 140ft by collecting or diverting, unless that is some major project, which again, a well driller is going to know about. If a major acquifer that a lot of people are using drops that much, it should be all over the news, with people having severe problems.

You really think he's going to go to some state water board and they're going to tell him, "Oh yeah, the xyz aquifer at 200ft has dropped 140ft because of the new dam on the whacko river..." and the local well driller isn't going to know about it? Maybe, but not very typical in my world.

You did read the part about the water level dropping

140 ft, right? That means the well itself must be significantly deeper than that. What kind of construction projects in your experience take out retaining layers of soil 200ft down, below an aquifer? How does one get the necessary DEP permits for that?

As usual, so far I don't see anyone agreeing with you.

Reply to
trader4

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