Wet Desert: Tracking Down a Terrorist on the Colorado River (27 page)

Fred got a terrified look on his face. He spoke so softly that Grant barely understood. "
Davis
is a landfill."

"What?" That didn't jive with what Grant remembered. "I've never been there, but I've seen pictures of the structure. I thought --"

Fred shook his head. "It's definitely a landfill. The water works are concrete, and so are the spillways, but the levy creating the dam is rock and dirt. It definitely can't be breached. Overtopping would break it in five minutes. It'd drain
Lake
Mojave
."

Grant remembered an aerial picture, taken at night, of Davis Dam and the Casinos downstream. The concrete waterworks were off to the side of the earth dam. "Damn! What about Parker downstream, it's definitely concrete, right?" Grant remembered Parker Dam. Parker was a semi-circle shaped concrete arch dam wedged into a tight canyon.

Fred nodded. "Parker is concrete, not a landfill."

"That's good, but it probably doesn't matter. It wouldn't hold if
Davis
busted upstream, and
Lake
Mojave
drained into
Lake
Havasu
. Would it?"

Fred rubbed his eyes. "
Lake
Mojave
is almost three times bigger than
Lake
Havasu
. The flood would definitely bust Parker."

Grant sat back in the chair and looked up at the ceiling. According to simple math, Davis Dam could not keep up with the water coming out of
Hoover
, even if only a foot of water went over the top of Hoover Dam. The water flow would overwhelm the output capacity of Davis Dam. He slowly looked up at Fred and held out his hands. "We can't save
Davis
, can we?"

Fred shook his head. He had obviously come to the same conclusion.

Grant slouched back into his chair. "How big is
Lake
Mojave
?" Grant's voice was lifeless.

"Just over a half a trillion gallons.
A little over five percent the size of
Lake Mead
."

"And
Lake
Havasu
is only a third of that?"

Fred answered without hesitation.
"Yeah, only a couple hundred billion gallons."

Grant thought it over. "Well according to the report from the Bureau, the water probably won't breach
Hoover
until tomorrow morning. Figure a couple more hours after that before
Lake
Mojave
rises high enough to bust
Davis
. I'd say by noon tomorrow, we're looking at the second biggest flood in
North America
since the ice age."

Fred stared at Grant with a confused look. "What's the biggest?"

Grant pointed out at
Lake Mead
. "The one that's already headed our way from
Glen
Canyon
."

Fred's eyes glazed over.
"Oh yeah.
I forgot about that one."

Grant sat up. "Hang on." He stood and looked downstream as if he could see all the way to Davis Dam. "If
Davis
is going to collapse anyway, why don't we turn it loose early, before the water gets down here?"

Fred wasn't following. "What do you mean?"

"We could get a couple bulldozers up on the dike and dig a little trench. All we'd have to do is get it started. The water would finish it"

Fred caught up. "You mean bust
Davis
ourselves? Break open the dam? What good will
that do
?"

"It'll spread out the damage a little. The water we let
go,
will be a lot less than
Lake
Mojave
tomorrow at noon when it's ready to overflow."

Fred waved his hands back and forth. "I don't see what difference it'll make. It's still going to flood all the houses in Laughlin and
Bullhead
City
, and bust through Parker Dam. Plus it'll leave even less time to evacuate the area."

Grant couldn't deny Fred's logic. "Is there anyway to drain Havasu at the same time? I wonder if we can blow Parker Dam and drain some of the water out of Havasu before we bust
Davis
?
"

Fred didn't respond. He looked around as if he was afraid somebody else was listening.

Grant got back to basics. "Look, let's go get the governor and at least get him to make the calls to get Davis and Parker to open the gates.

Fred held his hands out in front of him. "You're not going to say anything about busting the other two dams yet
are
you?"

Grant shook his head. "No, we'll wait to bring that up until after we get the gates open."

Fred stood and they both went to find the governor.

* * *

4:55 p.m. -
Lake Powell
,
Utah

Julie stopped to wait. Paul set down his armload of blankets on a clean rock. Erika sat down on a muddy rock, too tired to worry about getting dirty. Erika had been limping slightly and she showed Julie what was going to be an awful bruise on her hip from her leap from the houseboat. They waited for Max and Darlene. Darlene was traveling very slowly and was holding the group up.

Julie guessed they had started hiking down from the remains of the houseboat more than a half hour before. Julie's ankles and feet were aching even with the tennis shoes. She was also thirsty, and hungry. She realized now, that they should have searched through the remains of the houseboat for some food. Too bad she had not thought of that until it was too late.

As soon as Darlene and Max reached them, Paul started walking again. "Let's keep moving."

Julie helped Erika up. She had mud on her legs from the rock. As they walked Julie thought about brushing it off, but decided to ignore it. She was too tired to care and felt sure that Erika felt the same. Darlene and Max followed behind.

After they walked for a few minutes, Paul stopped and turned around, facing the girls. "Is this the section where Greg dropped us off?"

Julie looked around. "I don't think so. It looks completely different."

Erika nodded. "Yeah, it is. It just looks different because all this was underwater." She pointed at some rocks. "See, that's the ridge over there we walked along after we got out of the boat."

Julie stared for a moment before her eyes confirmed it. "Wow. Good thing we didn't leave the boat here like I wanted to, huh?" She managed a small smile. There were only a couple pools left with trapped water, none very large. The pool she and Erika had swum through was empty.

"The water is dropping that fast?" Max asked. "You guys were just here a while ago weren't you?"

Darlene stared at her husband. "Well, that's about how fast the water dropped while you were asleep."

Paul started off again. "We should be close, let's keep moving." The others followed.

Around the next bend was the section where Greg had swerved and both girls were thrown out of their seats. The water had drained this section too. Julie wondered if Mars would look similar. She had seen pictures of Mars and its rocks. The orange rocky landscape seemed exactly the same.

When they passed the boulder, they could see around the next bend. Although most of this section had also drained, a hundred feet away was the receding shore of the lake. Julie looked back and guessed in total the water had dropped twenty-five feet since they had left Greg. The sight of water ahead gave all five hikers a boost of energy and they picked up the pace. When Paul reached the water, he walked around it along the left shore. The canyon continued for another hundred feet before the next bend.

"Where is he?" Erika asked.

Paul cupped his hands. "GREG."

They listened, hoping he was just around the corner. No answer.

They continued hiking until they reached the bend. Vertical cliffs down to the water prevented them from avoiding getting wet.

"I'll swim around this bend and see if I can see him." Paul said.

"Crap." Erika sat down on another muddy rock. "I thought he'd be down here."

"He's probably just around the corner a little bit," Julie said, although she felt as disappointed as Erika.

Darlene sat down on a rock. By this time Paul had waded into the water. He waded out until the water was up to his chest then put his head in the water and started swimming. The bend wasn't too far and Paul reached it in a few minutes. He stopped for
a second
, treading water. He turned and started swimming back. He walked up the bank and ran his hand back through his hair. He motioned at the expanse of water they had just walked around. "This is just a hole." His voice came out winded from the swim. "The water has drained on the other side. We'll have to swim through, then hike again for a while."

"What?" Julie said. "This is just a pond?"

"Yeah.
I saw more wet rocks around the bend.

Julie wanted to complain, but she knew it wouldn't help. Darlene groaned.

Paul started rolling the blankets tight like a sleeping bag. Julie realized they would need to swim while holding their possessions over their heads to keep them dry. She motioned to Erika that they should get ready too.

She spread out two shirts and rolled everything else into them. Julie tied her car keys to the strings on her swimsuit.

Paul tried to keep the group focused. "Are you ready?" He held the roll of blankets over his head and waded into the water.

The others followed. By the time Julie got to the other side, the muscles in her arms were burning from holding the clothes above her head while swimming. Paul came down and took the clothes from her, and helped her up.

"Thanks," she said.

He helped Erika and Max,
then
Max held Darlene's hand as she climbed out. They were off again. Paul picked up the pace slightly which Julie didn't mind. She felt anxious to find Greg again. They had been gone a long time. She hoped nothing else had gone wrong. The thought of him not being there when they arrived kept popping back into her head. She tried to push it out, knowing that he would be waiting, but she kept picturing an image of him screaming as the Mastercraft floated over the Glen Canyon Dam. In the image, she was looking over the edge of the dam and the boat kept falling and falling until she lost sight of Greg in the mist of the waterfall.

Paul had put a little bit of distance between himself and the group. He turned and yelled for the others. "We made it. I see him."

The tired feeling seemed to subside as Julie covered the distance. As she rounded the next bend in the river, she saw a pool of water that this time seemed to go on forever. Greg was floating about a hundred feet from the edge. He apparently hadn't seen them yet.

"GREG, WE MADE IT."

His head cocked and he smiled.
"About time."
He fired up the boat and
idled
it over to where all five hikers were now standing. "I was beginning to wonder if you guys were ever coming back."

Julie saw Greg look them over, especially Erika and Darlene. Erika was starting to look like a ghost. She didn't have any color in her face except for the red dirt and dried blood. Her eyes were lifeless. Darlene was breathing heavy. Julie looked down at herself and decided she didn't look very good either. She had the red dirt on her legs and swimsuit. Paul, on the other hand, looked fine.

"What happened to Erika?" Greg asked.

While Max handed bundles of clothes and blankets to Greg in the boat, Julie gave a brief description of the events at the houseboat including Erika's last second jump to safety. Erika didn't peep for the whole conversation. Max then gave a short explanation of his and Darlene's aborted kayak trip. When finished, Julie reached up to climb in the boat. Greg raised his eyebrows, and told her to rinse off first, a testament to how dirty she was. The other four followed Julie's example, cleaning and refreshing
themselves
in the water, before climbing in the boat.

A few moments later they were under way. The padded seats and the breeze felt wonderful. Julie took a long swig from the water jug and passed it back to the others. She had a clear view back at Erika. She was falling asleep, the poor girl.

* * *

5:00 p.m. -
Grand Canyon
,
Arizona

"Right side paddle.
Left side paddle.
COME ON. Becky, don't give up."

David was exhausted. "We're trying Keller."

"One last burst.
NOW.
Paddle.
Right side.
Left."

The current moved them quickly along a rocky shore toward a sandy canyon inlet just up ahead. They needed to be in perfect position or they would miss it, and they were going too fast. Keller had tried to maneuver the raft so they could land in the big campground. But the current was pulling them away from the beach, out into the river.