Risks to the Glen Canyon Dam that the resulting flood would scour the bottom few hundred feet of the Grand Canyon, overtop Hoover Dam, and cause severe damage all along the lower Colorado River. In the event of a complete dam failure with Lake Powell at high pool, about of water would surge out of Lake Powell at an initial depth of over . Downstream communities and perhaps every dam along the river, excluding possibly Hoover Dam, as well as riverside lowlands, would be inundated or severely damaged. Located downstream from Glen Canyon Dam are Hoover Dam forming Lake Mead, Davis Dam forming Lake Mohave, Parker
Glen Canyon Dam the Colorado's major upper tributary, at Echo Park and Split Mountain. The 1956 Colorado River Storage Project Act authorized the purposes of "regulating the flow of the Colorado River, storing water for beneficial consumptive use, providing for reclamation of arid and semi-arid lands, providing flood control, and generating hydropower." The proposal for Glen Canyon Dam was most vocally supported by the state of Arizona, which wished to get Colorado River water to Phoenix and Tucson, located hundreds of miles away from the Colorado in the center of the state. Glen Canyon Dam would regulate river flow between Lee's Ferry and