PEMBROKE PARK, Fla. – Phil Perez is a millwright for South Florida Water Management. Right now, he's maintaining a pump that's about 60 years old and helps keep South Florida from devastating floods when a storm moves in.
"This particular pump here pumps 489,000 gallons a minute," Perez said. "You're looking at about seven Olympic-sized pools in one minute."
South Florida's regional water management system works with 2,100 miles of canals, 600 water control structures and 70 pump stations.
"By use of the canals and pumping stations and water control structures, we're able to keep what used to be a swamp, dry enough for us to build our homes and businesses," South Florida Water Management spokesman Randy Smith said.
The S-13 pump station, which was built in 1954, is location at the C11 near Orange Drive and State Road 441.
"You have a main engine, a gear box and below us is a pump -- a large pump," South Field Operations Bureau Chief Michael Gallagher said.
A gate is used to move water by gravity, but later in the rainy season the tides rise, and that's when heavy machinery is needed to pump water to the east.
"So that's when these pumps become critical to provide flood protection to the cities to the west," Gallagher said.
Storms can also affect the water levels at Florida's largest freshwater lake. South Florida Water Management is responsible for managing that too.
Experts say Lake Okeechobee's water level is a little more than 13 feet. That's within the acceptable range, but it is on the high side when you consider that we're not in hurricane season yet.
"So what they're doing is releasing water to the east, west and some into the south to the water conservation areas to bring it down before the serious rainy season," Smith said.
Two out of the three water conservation areas are nearing capacity, and Smith said they will manage the levels by taking some water out "so we can put more water into it."
Some of the water will be pushed out into the estuaries, and the rest will go toward the water supply and used if it's dry.
"It all works together to make the system work," Smith said.
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