Which manmade waterway features the Gatun and Milafiores Locks?
Gatun Dam Gatun Dam The Gatun Dam is a large earthen dam across the Chagres River in Panama, near the town of Gatun. The dam, constructed between 1907 and 1913, is a crucial element of the Panama Canal; it impounds the artificial Gatun Lake, which in turn carries ships for of their transit across the Isthmus of Panama. In addition, a hydro-electric generating station at the dam generates electricity which is used to operate the locks and other equipment in the canal. Construction of the dam was a great engineering achievement, eclipsed only by the parallel excavation of the Culebra Cut; at
Gatun Dam is regulated by spillways that control the water flow out of the dam to obtain an almost constant height in wet or dry seasons. The lake also acts as a massive reservoir to work the locks on both the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Ocean ends of the canal and provides via hydro-electric generators about 6 MW of electrical power needed to run the locks and dam. After finishing the dam and filling Gatun Lake it was dredged where necessary to obtain a clear ship channel across the lake. The Gatun location was in most ways ideal for a dam; upstream