State inspectors scrambled Tuesday to ensure that small dams in Geauga County and two east-central Ohio counties were not in danger of washing away in the way a Gates Mills dam did during widespread flooding Monday.

All three of the structures, including a 9-foot-high wall holding back water in the Burton Lakes subdivision in Geauga, had overflowed Monday following a massive rush of water from weekend snowmelt and up to 3 inches of rain.

But inspectors determined that none of the three dams was "compromised significantly," an official from the Ohio Department of Natural Resources said Tuesday afternoon.

The ODNR regulates and inspects about 1,650 of the 50,000 small dams in Ohio. The agency focuses primarily on dams that are in the worst condition or upstream of large populations.

"We came through it OK this time," said Rodney Tornes, a program manager for the ODNR's Dam Safety Engineering Program.

The Burton dam had last been inspected by the ODNR in 2000. A report then shows that the dam, built in the 1950s, had been breached in the 1970s.

The structure is now owned and maintained by the Geauga County Sanitary Engineer's office, records shows. The ODNR in 2000 had ordered the county to remove some trees and brush from the upstream slope of the dam, repair rodent burrows in the embankment and do other minor repairs.

The two other dams were in Muskingum and Carroll counties in east-central Ohio, Tornes said.

One Northeast Ohio dam that has long concerned ODNR inspectors is the 37-foot-high, 318-foot-long dam at Lee Road and Forest Hills Boulevard in East Cleveland.

If that dam were to fail, up to 100 lives downstream could be in jeopardy, according to state reports. The dam has been showing "severe deficiencies" for several years, the reports said.

"Even if we haven't addressed all of their concerns, we don't believe anyone is in real danger," said East Cleveland Service Director Ross Brankatelli. "We don't have homes even within 1,000 feet of that dam, and there's a huge culvert that would take in the water if the dam failed."

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Inspectors in 2009 noted in their report that East Cleveland had done nothing to improve the condition of the dam since a 2006 report concluded that there were significant problems with erosion at the spillway and that the city had no plan for regular or adequate maintenance on the dam.

"That dam did OK during the Monday flooding," Brankatelli countered. "We had maybe a 2-foot flow over the weir, but that was about it."

But some officials have worried aloud that Monday's melt-and-rain storm was hardly historic, even if it led to widespread flooding.

In fact, many of Ohio's dams have not been severely tested in 40 years -- maybe since the July 4, 1969, storm that affected most of the state, Tornes said. His comments echoed those made in February by officials with the Northeast Ohio Areawide Coordinating Agency and the National Weather Service in regard to regionwide flooding.

There's a deluge down the road that is likely to put the dams to the test -- but Monday's wasn't the one.

"Even though this was more than just a 2- to 3-inch rainfall event with the melt-off, it wasn't the kind of rain event they had in Findlay or we've had years ago," said meteorologist Mike Abair of the National Weather Service station at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport.

The ODNR's Tornes said the largest dams are supposed to be built to withstand the overflow from up to 20 inches of rain over three days -- the kind of rain a region can get from the still-powerful remnant of a hurricane, not merely hit-and-miss thunderstorms.

"We've got a pretty aggressive inspection program, and dams are being improved all the time," he said. "But there's no doubt we could someday be put to the test if and when we get that kind of really significant regionwide storm."

And that's why the Monday washout of the Gates Mills dam didn't much concern the ODNR or even local engineers, even if it was temporarily impressive.

The Gates Mills dam -- a 6-foot-high, 110-foot-wide concrete structure -- was demolished Monday morning when the stream swelled to well over flood stage.

Anglers and environmentalists often celebrate the demise of any dams, saying that fish will be able to go farther upstream for spawning (or at least for catching). Also, a free-flowing stream is better for overall water quality and thus healthier for plants, fish and other aquatic species.

On the other hand, some officials are increasingly concerned that dam removals may open some of Ohio's tributaries to invasive species such as the sea lamprey -- or even the dreaded Asian carp -- to more easily swim upstream to lay their eggs.

To reach this Plain Dealer reporter: mscott@plaind.com, 216-999-4148