Chickamauga Lake Water Level
Chickamauga Lake is at 680.61 ft today (Oct 6), 1.39 ft below its 682 ft full pool, down 0.56 ft this week.
Tennessee · Tennessee River
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Water level history
About Chickamauga Lake
Chickamauga Lake is a reservoir on the Tennessee River in Tennessee, operated by Tennessee Valley Authority. It sits just above Chattanooga. Its full summer pool sits at 682 ft above sea level. Live water levels come from the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) and update hourly.
Understanding Chickamauga Lake's water level
Chickamauga Lake is the reservoir Chattanooga sits below. Its dam crosses the Tennessee River at mile 471, about six miles northeast of downtown, and backs water 59 miles upstream to Watts Bar Dam, covering roughly 36,240 acres with 784 miles of shoreline. TVA runs it on a two season schedule rather than a fixed pool. In winter the lake is held down toward its minimum of 675 feet, which opens room for storm runoff; in spring it is raised into a summer operating band of 681.5 to 682.5 feet, and the 682 shown here as full pool sits in the middle of that band. The seasonal swing is only about seven and a half feet because main river lakes also have to keep an 11 foot navigation channel open to Knoxville, as the TVA Act requires. The winter space, 345,300 acre-feet of flood storage, is the lake's real job. Chattanooga had been badly flooded in 1867, 1875, 1886 and 1917, and TVA credits Chickamauga and the reservoirs above it with preventing nearly $5 billion in flood damage in the city alone.
TVA started the dam on January 13, 1936, and began storing water on February 6, 1940; the lake first reached minimum navigation pool on March 10 of that year. The dam is 129 feet high and 5,800 feet long, and its spillway carries eighteen lift gates, each 40 feet wide and a little over 40 feet tall, with the top of the gates at 685.44 feet. Building the reservoir meant buying 61,350 acres and relocating 903 families, 24 cemeteries and 81 miles of road. The old town of Harrison was partly submerged, and its name survives in Harrison Bay. The original lock, 60 by 360 feet, lifts boats about 50 feet between Nickajack Lake and Chickamauga, but its concrete swells and cracks from an alkali aggregate reaction between the cement and the rock in it. The Corps of Engineers has spent about two decades building a 110 by 600 foot replacement that will pass nine jumbo barges per lockage instead of one. The final contract went to C.J. Mahan in February 2026 for about $192 million, and in May 2026 the Corps terminated Shimmick Construction's lock chamber contract over schedule and quality problems.
For bass anglers the lake carries a specific history. Starting in 2000, TWRA stocked Florida strain largemouth fingerlings into Chickamauga, nearly 1.9 million of them by 2010, to push the population toward bigger fish; genetic samples from three embayments that year found Florida genes in 33.7 percent of largemouth, more than double the 15 percent goal. Stocking continued, including 183,830 fingerlings in 2015. That February 13, Gabe Keen caught a 15 pound, 3 ounce largemouth in the lower lake near Chester Frost Park, breaking a state record that had stood since 1954. It held for eleven years, until a heavier fish from Nickajack, the next lake down, was certified in May 2026. Farther up the lake, the Hiwassee River comes in at the Hiwassee Refuge in Meigs County, 6,000 acres of land and water that hold the largest winter flock of sandhill cranes in the Southeast outside Florida, up to 20,000 birds, celebrated each January at a festival in Birchwood. On the lower lake sit two state parks from the 1930s: Harrison Bay, about 1,200 acres, and Booker T. Washington, 353 acres, built largely by African American CCC units and reserved for Black visitors under segregation until 1964.
Chickamauga Lake — frequently asked
What is Chickamauga Lake's full pool?
This page uses 682 feet above sea level. TVA does not hold one fixed level; it gives a typical summer operating range of 681.5 to 682.5 feet, so 682 is the middle of the summer band. The lake can rise above that in floods, since the spillway gates top out at 685.44 feet, and in winter TVA lets it fall to as low as 675 feet.
Why is Chickamauga Lake lower in winter?
TVA draws it down toward a winter minimum of 675 feet so the lake can catch winter and spring storm runoff before it reaches Chattanooga. That space is part of 345,300 acre-feet of flood storage. The drop is modest compared with a flood control lake on a tributary because Chickamauga is a main river lake and must keep water deep enough for barges year round, with an 11 foot channel required from Paducah to Knoxville.
What is the record high level on Chickamauga Lake?
USGS lists the highest elevation in the period of record, which starts in 1939, as 687.13 feet on May 7, 2003. That is about four and a half feet above the top of the summer operating range and nearly two feet above the top of the spillway gates at 685.44. The recent gauge high shown on this page, 683.42 in 2024, is well short of it.
What is the lowest Chickamauga Lake has been?
USGS gives the minimum after the lake's first filling as 673.27 feet on January 21, 1942, about 1.7 feet below today's 675 foot winter minimum. The recent low shown by this page's gauge, 675.61 in 2024, is a normal winter drawdown level rather than a drought extreme.
When does Chickamauga Lake fill up in spring?
The rise into summer pool happens mostly in April. USGS monthly readings from 2004 show a typical pattern: 677.33 feet at the end of March, 681.63 at the end of April, and 682.40 at the end of May, then drifting back down through the fall. Heavy spring rain can speed the rise or push the lake above the summer band for a few days.
What is happening with the Chickamauga Lock replacement?
The Corps of Engineers is building a 110 by 600 foot lock beside the original 60 by 360 foot chamber, whose concrete is deteriorating from an alkali aggregate reaction. The new lock will take nine jumbo barges at a time instead of one. The Corps awarded the final contract to C.J. Mahan in February 2026, then terminated Shimmick Construction's lock chamber contract on May 8, 2026, and is weighing how to finish the chamber.
Does Chickamauga Lake still hold the Tennessee record largemouth bass?
Not anymore. Gabe Keen's 15 pound, 3 ounce largemouth, caught February 13, 2015 near Chester Frost Park, was the state record for eleven years. In May 2026 TWRA certified a 15 pound, 7.5 ounce fish caught by Darren Nunley on Nickajack, just below Chickamauga Dam. Chickamauga's Florida strain stocking, begun in 2000, is still the reason many anglers come here looking for a heavy bass.
Other lakes near Chickamauga Lake
- Dale Hollow LakeKY/TN
- Cherokee LakeTN
- Douglas LakeTN
- Center Hill LakeTN
- Fort Loudoun LakeTN
- Boone LakeTN
See current levels for all 23 Tennessee lakes and reservoirs →
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