Dear Gary :

Nice to hear from you. I really enjoyed the time in Frankfort, KY teaching. You are very lucky to have such beautiful surroundings.

These messages that you are reporting are really not error messages, but warning messages. They are meant to be informative to the modeler, and do not necessarily mean that there are problems with the model. However, should the DAMBRK model not run, then these are possible locations where you might look to solve the problem.

The warning message "Inflow hydrograph contains low inflow values..." is always generated when there is any value defined in the inflow hydrograph that is less than 1000 cfs (or equivalent value for cms). However, again, this does not mean that DAMBRK will not run. However, DAMBRK is a "wet model" and needs to have a certain amount of base flow to start up and run. A flow value of 0.0 will definitely cause DAMBRK to fail. And, if your flow value is low and the channel bottom wide and flat (so that essentially there is minimal flow depth), then again DAMBRK will most likely fail to run.

The warning message "Inflow hydrograph safety-net feature..." is generated whenever the Theta Weighting Factor has not been set to 0.5. Setting the inflow hydrograph safety-net feature is something that Dr. Fread added to the DAMBRK program to prevent the river base flow from dropping less than the initial flow value at time 0.0 that was defined in the upstream most reservoir inflow hydrograph.

If you have any additional questions or need any further information, please contact me again.

Sincerely,

Chris E. Maeder, M.S.
Senior Technical Engineer
chris.maeder@bossintl.com