Lake's not so great

The Great Salt Lake isn't as great anymore.

Maybe those mothballed Great Salt Lake pumps should be retired to a museum. They likely won't be needed for many years. After two decades of being highly visible from along I-15 in Centerville, the lake has now receded sharply and is at its lowest level — 4,198 feet above sea level — since 1980.

Even at Saltair and Black Rock on the southern shore, the falling lake has created a large mud plain. Boaters, particularly those on Antelope Island, are now concerned that if trends continue, there soon won't be enough water to launch off the harbor without significant modifications.

Contrast that with as recently as 15 years ago when the massive pumps were used to try to preserve I-80 and reclaim the Antelope Island causeway and other land from record-high water levels that caused some $250 million in damages.

More heat and less precipitation are what's lowering the lake. "It's been real hot and dry," Wallace Gwynn, a geologist with the Utah Geological Survey, said.

Indeed, Gwynn said he'll go out on a limb by predicting the lake level will bottom out this year on about Dec. 1 at 4,197.15 feet. The last time it was that low was in 1970-72.

"I took eight years of downtrends and averages," Gwynn said, as the basis of his prediction.

He said if the drought continues, the level may go as low as 4,196 feet next year, the lowest elevation since about 1970.

Dale R. Hawkins of Kaysville, professor emeritus at Weber State University's School of Business, has his own unorthodox system for predicting the level of the lake. He uses the principles of business charts.

He believes the lake will likely remain in a downward trend until 2005, based on his chart interpretations, and that means three more years of drought. He's predicting a low lake level of 4,197.5 feet by Sept. 15 — the end of the water season — this year.

Deseret News graphic Elevation of the Great Salt Lake Requires Adobe Acrobat.

The lake level normally falls each year from summer into late fall before lower temperatures and moisture raise it again in the winter and spring. The lake level is entirely dependent on the weather.

The lake's historic peak came during the "flood years" of 1986 and 1987 at 4,212 feet. Its all-time low, 4,191.35, was in 1963. The historic average on which most maps are based is 4,200 feet.

Because it's such a shallow lake, even minor drops expose much more land area around the lake. For example, at 4,200 feet above sea level, the lake covers 1,700 miles. At its all-time 1963 low point, it only covered 950 square miles compared with its 1986-87 high point, when it expanded to 3,300 square miles.