As the local insomniac sheriff drove around sleepy Saint George Utah on the moonless New Years midnight between 1988 and 1989, announcing the impending upstream failure of the 78-foot-high Quail Creek Dike, revelers came out of their houses to greet them and wish them Happy New Years. The ill-begotten dike had been seeping for years, leaking for months and gushing for weeks. Despite three aggressive (maybe too aggressive) grouting programs the dam had begun to collapse, and failure was imminent. Copious turbid seepage, smelling of silt and tasting of salt, had been noticed that morning flowing from the toe and the owner was called in, their engineer was called that afternoon and the State Dam Safety was called late that evening but there was nothing to be done. The rudimentary EAP was put in place as they watched their cookie crumble.
By 12:30 AM the dike had failed catastrophically, by 1:00 the dike was gone and by 2-3:00 that morning 40,000 acre-feet of water had flushed down the off-channel hogbacks to the Virgin River, removing a large section of Highway 9 and several bridges, flooding farms and subdivisions before crossing under Interstate 15 several times on its way to Arizona, Nevada and Lake Mead. There was no loss of life, thankfully, because that would have put the disaster into a much higher realm of concern. There are two types of failures: fatal and non-fatal. That is key.
That was 35 years ago. I was there. I was 29. This is my true story, for the next generation. The statute of limitations must be exceeded by now. These are my impressions of the events that preceded and followed this incident. Most of them are true. Details are foggy but factual, to the best of my knowledge. If you want the details read the investigation documents online. The names of the players have been omitted or forgotten. The lessons learned are real and universal and should never be forgotten.
