Reborn from record winter, Tulare Lake could see explosive growth from snowmelt
Tulare Lake has sprung back to life, its shoreline rapidly expanding from the runoff of a winter of epic rainstorms and the melting of the massive southern Sierra snowpack. The lake, which has been mostly dry for decades, now covers miles of rich farmland and is threatening to overwhelm nearby communities. … Tulare Lake is back to claim roads, orchards, farms, and anything left behind on that land. It is a disaster unfolding in slow motion, threatening everything around it, including the city of Corcoran. The lake has wrapped itself around the southern and western sides of Corcoran, so the community is now completely dependent on the levees designed to box in and protect this pocket of land. It probably will be for some time to come. Corcoran is the largest single community threatened by the reborn lake, and that includes the 8,000 inmates in the city’s state prison facilities.