Lockington Dam
Lockington Dam is an earthen embankment located across the Loramie Creek in southern Shelby County near the Village of Lockington. The road across the top of the dam is a maintenance road closed to the public. Construction of the dam began in February of 1918 and was completed in October of 1921.
The dam has two concrete conduits through the base of the embankment near the center of the valley. The conduits are sized to discharge floodwaters at a rate that can be handled by the flood protection levees and channels downstream. The remainder of the floodwaters are temporarily stored behind the dam and released over time. An emergency spillway is located directly above the conduits in the same structure.
Lockington Dam Statistics
- 6,400 feet long
- 69 feet high
- 409 feet wide at dam base
- 1.135 million cubic yards of earth in the embankment
- Two concrete conduits
- Each conduit is 46 feet long, 9.2 feet high and 9 feet wide.
- The spillway is 72 feet long.
- Volume of concrete in the conduits and spillway is
38,000 cubic yards. - Drainage area above Lockington Dam is 255 square miles.
Elevation and Hydraulic Information
- Elevation of the dam is 954 feet above sea level.
- Peak elevation Probable Maximum Flood is 948 feet above sea level.
- Spillway elevation is 938 feet above sea level.
- Peak elevation Official Plan Flood (OPF) is 940 above sea level.
- Elevation where storage begins is 888 feet above sea level.
- Peak discharge for OPF is 9,000 cubic feet per second.
- Time to empty the storage area after an Official Plan Flood is seven days.
- Water stored to the spillway would inundate 4,020 acres of land upstream from Lockington Dam. The 70,000 acre-feet of water would extend along Loramie Creek 18 miles to Ohio 705 in Fort Loramie, Shelby County.
Ten Highest Storage Events At Lockington Dam, 1922-2023
| Date | Elevation (ft. above sea level) | Depth (ft.) | Storage (percent) |
| Capacity | 937.2 | 62.0 | 100.0 |
| 07/09/2003 | 911.6 | 36.4 | 17.2 |
| 06/11/1958 | 911.4 | 36.2 | 17.1 |
| 01/22/1959 | 909.0 | 33.8 | 13.6 |
| 12/31/1990 | 908.6 | 33.4 | 13.0 |
| 12/22/2013 | 907.4 | 32.2 | 11.6 |
| 03/21/1927 | 907.3 | 32.1 | 11.4 |
| 05/13/1933 | 906.6 | 31.4 | 10.7 |
| 04/22/1964 | 906.4 | 31.2 | 10.5 |
| 01/12/2005 | 905.7 | 30.4 | 9.4 |
| 01/06/2005 | 905.2 | 30.0 | 8.9 |