Course of the Colorado River Lake Mead, formed by the -high Hoover Dam about southeast of Las Vegas, Nevada, is the largest reservoir in the United States with a full capacity of and a water surface of nearly . However, the lake has not been full for many years due to a combination of drought and increased water usage by Colorado River Basin states. Situated in the Lake Mead National Recreation Area, Lake Mead is a popular recreation site – visited by almost 8 million people a year – and a critical source of water for the Las Vegas metropolitan area, Central Arizona and Southern
Course of the Colorado River into the Salton Sink flooding farmland and creating the Salton Sea, which still exists today as the largest inland body of water in California. The river was finally diverted back to its present course in 1907. Geological evidence suggests that this has happened naturally many times in the past, filling Lake Cahuilla, with the floodwaters slowly evaporating over spans of decades before being re-flooded by the Colorado. The Colorado River meets the Mexico–United States border at the Northern International Boundary (NIB), where the Morelos Dam diverts nearly the entire remaining flow into the Reforma Canal and the Tijuana Aqueduct. Most