A couple of minutes before midnight on March 12th, 1928, in San Francisquito Canyon ten miles north of San Clarita, California, St. Francis dam suffered a catastrophic failure, collapsed and sent 12.4 billon gallons of water down the Santa Clarita river. The initial gush of water propelled a wall of water one hundred feet high cascading down the canyon towards the cities of Santa Clarita, Fillmore, Santa Paula, Ventura and finally the sea. The ensueing flood lasted almost six hours, taking the lives of over six hundred souls. A location on the Santa Clarita river near where Six Flags Magic Mountain stands today was then estimated to be under up to fifty feet of water. William Mulholland, chief engineer and designer of the dam, who had inspected the dam the morning of March 12th and declared its integrity sound, was devasted by the disaster and never engaged in any further engineering endeavors afterwards. It really wasnt his fault. The dam was built on an ancient landslide, which was far beyond the technology of the 1920s to detect. Mulholland may have been a scoungrel and did some terrible stuff in his day, but this wasnt one of them. The victims of this disaster were martyrs to our learning curve, pioneers of a new age: proof that we dont know everything. Every time we engage in such a marvel, we must be prepared to have our marvels turn on us and expose our weakness. Everytime we do the math, we better be ready for the math to do us. So please, could you join me and take a moment today to remember the poor souls whose lives were tragically ended eigthy-six years ago, and also remember the countless unnamed heroes of that evening and the days and weeks that followed. More lives were saved than lost, and it must have been a harrowing experience. May God bless them. kcet.org/socal/departures/columns/lost-landmarks/the-flood-st-francis-dam-disaster-william-mulholland-and-the-casualties-of-la-imperialism.html
Posted on: Wed, 12 Mar 2014 06:54:23 +0000
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