Wet Desert: Tracking Down a Terrorist on the Colorado River (58 page)

"What's he doing?" asked Lloyd.

Don answered, "He's getting a chain ready; in case the other one gets in trouble, he can hook onto him and pull him out."

While the first operator stretched out the chain, the other D-11 Caterpillar pivoted, placing the right track on the downstream edge of the dike and the blade facing away from them. He stopped. Even from a distance, the group saw the water streams through the notch had increased slightly in the last few minutes, and the tracks of the bulldozer glistened wet. After the two drivers waved to each other, the second D-11 dropped his blade and cut a two-foot deep swath, stopping after only ten feet, as dirt piled up in front of the blade. The D-11 reversed back through the two-feet-deep water. Grant guessed it would take four more passes to open the dike.

"Why is he starting downstream?" asked Grant.

Don glanced over at him and shrugged. "I don't know; maybe he's afraid if he starts on the upstream side, the downstream side will wash out."

That made sense. Either way, after the last cut he figured the bulldozer wouldn't stop but hustle his rig up the slope as fast as he could.

After the bulldozer completed its second pass and again reversed through the water, Grant looked at Don. "How deep of water can they drive through?"

Don smiled. "I asked the same question. They said they could go to the top of the tracks, if the ground under them was firm. That'd be over four feet."

The bulldozer reversed from his third pass and prepared for what they knew would be the final assault on the notch in the Palo Verde Diversion Dam. Grant felt some sweat run down the center of his back.

"Here comes the hard part," said Don.

The D-11 hesitated for an instant, sitting with its right track on the edge of the dike, then black smoke poured out of the exhaust stack and it lurched forward. Almost immediately Grant saw water flowing off the dike from behind the blade and through the
crawlers
tracks. As the dirt piled up in front of the dozer, he lifted the blade and continued over the top of the dirt he had just pushed and the driver raced for the slope. The other D-11, seeing that he wouldn't be needed, accelerated forward out of his way. Both of them climbed up the slope onto the other side, not stopping until they both sat on top of the dike.

Behind them, the two-foot deep by ten-foot wide channel cut by the second dozer flowed off the downstream side of the dike.

Lloyd turned to face Grant and shrugged.
"Doesn't seem like enough to do anything."

"Don't take your eyes off it," Grant said.

Grant suddenly wished he had a video camera. He looked around and saw that somebody else did, likely one of Don's guys from the irrigation district.

For what seemed like a minute or two, the water appeared to only be increasing slightly. Then suddenly Grant realized it had doubled. The rising reservoir itself was making it harder to focus on the ditch, since water now flowed across the entire notch, making a 70 foot wide waterfall, and obscuring the deeper ditch in the center. But the water in the center ditch grew swifter by the second. Unlike the waterfall that simply dropped off the dike, the ditch water shot through, causing the water below to churn into a brown froth. Grant guessed the ditch was much wider than ten feet now.

For the next few seconds, the water volume and trajectory increased almost as fast as a hose while opening the valve. Then Grant saw something spectacular and unexpected which drew an "ooh" from the other bystanders. The volume in the ditch suddenly increased enough to drop the reservoir right next to the dike, which killed the waterfall over the top like curtains being drawn, as the waterfall disappeared from inside to out.

With the waterfall gone, they could see the ditch better, and it looked to be at least 30 feet wide and 25 feet deep. A loud cracking sound startled the group. They all looked downstream in time to see a large tree in the river bottoms get toppled by the raging river.

While everyone watched, a large section of dirt on the
Arizona
side broke off and sloughed into the water only to disappear immediately. Not a second later, a similar slab followed from the
California
side. The combination of the two seemed to double the flow. Grant looked upstream and saw the water in the reservoir had dropped over five feet right next to the dike. And the previously still water could be seen moving quickly toward the cut. More of the dike sloughed off every few seconds until the ditch had widened to almost the entire 70 feet cut down by the two D-11s. This perspective was reinforced when part of the slope the dozers had used to climb out collapsed into the stream. As a result, both D-11s poured black smoke out their exhausts and surged away, heading along the dike toward the
Arizona
riverbank. The policemen and others standing on the dike ran to distance themselves from the cut.

When Grant thought the flow had decreased, he looked upstream. He saw the wet band around the reservoir all along the river had dropped another five feet. Downstream, the river was a mess. The color ran an ugly brown and had spread wide, filling the old river bed for what Grant guessed was the first time since spring floods before Hoover dam was built, during the 1930s. The river bucked, jigged, and swirled around trees and other obstacles that hadn't been threatened for the last 70 years.

The water blasting out of the cut in the dike was less visible now, as the water level downstream had risen almost as high as the reservoir upstream.

"Wow," said Lloyd.

Grant nodded.
"Yeah.
That's a good way to describe it."

Don turned and faced Grant, visibly shaken. "What now?"

Grant looked at his watch. "Now we wait. The water should be arriving here some time in the next twenty minutes." Grant patted Don on the shoulder. "Hey, the hard part's over. You did it. That was a lot better than waiting for the reservoir to rise another twenty feet to the top of the dikes and let it break itself. Now, in a couple of months when Hoover's spillways stop and things get back to normal, you can fix your dike and you'll be back in business."

Don forced a smile. "You act like it's no big deal."

Grant looked serious. "It isn't, compared to what happened to the Indians upstream. There's dead people up there, homes washed away, farmland flooded," Grant pointed at the concrete structure, "and their dam is gonna suffer over the next couple months, millions of dollars worth of damage."

Don seemed to think about that. "Speaking of the structure, you think I should open my head gates again?"

Grant looked upstream.
"Yeah, why not?
The more water that flows through the gates, the less to wash away your dike."
Don nodded and walked off to get the gates open.

"So we gonna hang around? Wait for the flood water?" said Lloyd.

"Absolutely."
Grant pointed downstream at the raging brown
Colorado River
. "According to Shauna's numbers, it'll take almost three and a half hours for the water to work its way down to
Yuma
and the Imperial Dam."

* * *

2:00 p.m. - East of
El Centro
,
California

The skinny man slammed his fist against the steering wheel and cursed loudly.

National guardsmen swarmed along the banks of the
All
American
Canal
, not just the bridges and the overpasses either. They were everywhere, and the canal was over eighty miles long.

His plan had been perfect. The whole area between
El Centro
and
Yuma
was an off-roader's dream with sand dunes as far as the eye could see. All he needed to do was stop at one of the many OHV spots, find an isolated parking spot next to the canal, set a ten-minute timer, and be five miles down the road when the canal blew and started watering the desert.

Now what? He had already driven past all the places he had scouted, and the soldiers were crawling all over the thing. They weren't even letting motorcycles approach the canal, let alone his pickup.

He pulled into one of the lots and stopped next to a motor home, letting the engine run. The
All
American
Canal
was still 50 yards away, 50 yards of deep sand. The soldiers carried assault rifles. He wondered if they would shoot him if he drove over there. He knew they'd be reluctant to shoot a civilian. But then again, they were probably hot and bored and he wouldn't put it past them. The idea of planting his bomb was unthinkable.

He wished he had one of those anti-tank weapons, the ones that shoot a little rocket out of a tube. He could stand next to the motor home, take aim, pull the trigger, and bingo. He salivated at the thought. He imagined it blowing sand all over the place, in a bright fiery ball, with
soldiers
flying head over heels in all directions.

A year before, when he planned the bombings, he knew everything would be easier with the good stuff: missile launchers, plastic explosives, and wireless detonators. Although everything could be had for a price, his finances wouldn't allow for that. Besides, it would have required that he work with others, and broaden his circle. And he didn't trust anybody. If he could do it alone, without anyone else, that would be the best way.

He hadn't done too poorly, either. The Glen Canyon Dam was history, and the California Aqueduct. Too bad about Davis Dam; the three of them would have made a nice little package, a portfolio of success. But two out of three wasn't bad. Besides, if that sandbag fiasco the government was building didn't work,
Hoover
and
Davis
would get busted.

He was proud of the aqueduct, but
Glen
Canyon
was a miracle. He couldn't think of a better word. Sure, he had prepared for a year, but he couldn't help but feel that God had intervened for him, a strange thought for a guy who normally considered himself an atheist. But there had definitely been a god at
Glen
Canyon
, a god who had mourned for the river as he did.

He forced his mind back to the issue at hand. At this point he had no ideas how to blow the
All
American
Canal
. It had been an important part of his agenda, being the largest by far of the diversions off the
Colorado River
, over twice as big as the aqueduct. Blowing the canal would have forced Imperial Dam to send the water downstream into
Mexico
where it belonged. As soon as the explosion occurred, they would have radioed the dam and closed the gates immediately. If only he knew the phone number and could make the call himself.

The thought made him pause. Could it work? What if he didn't blow up anything, but just called in a report of an explosion, or a bomb scare? Would they shut the gates? He didn't think so. They had too many eyes on the canal; they would know immediately that there had not been an explosion, and they were unlikely to shut the gates until they confirmed a large leak. Even if he had the phone number, he couldn't think of what to say to make them shut the gates.

He scratched his chin. Maybe the
All
American
Canal
would have to survive. It was a thought that took the energy out of him, and put a knot in his stomach.

He reached forward and pulled the shift lever into reverse. Turning his head from the canal, he looked over his shoulder and backed away from the motor home. If only there was something he could do to make them shut the gates. But what would possibly make them shut down canals that furnished water for irrigation and drinking to so many people?

He slammed on the brakes. The truck skidded to a stop in the sand. Of course! Why hadn't he thought about it before? What would make farmers want to shut it off? How would you get households to demand that their drinking water was turned off? He laughed out loud.

He shifted the truck into drive and headed back to the freeway. He needed a phonebook. The phone number for Imperial Dam would be best, but even the cops would do. It was starting to look like God loved the river as much as he did.

* * *

2:05 p.m. -
Hoover
Dam,
Nevada

Fred Grainger watched the national guardsman place the last sandbag on Hoover-Two. The soldier slid it effortlessly in the gap between the two other bags. And it was done. The dike was complete.

For the first time since the construction began, the mass of national guardsmen stopped moving. They hesitated, glancing back and forth between each other. Then they started yelling. Arms pumped into the air, whistles were heard, clapping. Fred couldn't stop the smile from stretching across his face. They had done
it,
and none too soon. The water in
Lake Mead
was still rising, and had eclipsed the original height of Hoover Dam hours ago.

An hour earlier it had been touch and go, as the water had reached the top of some of the sandbags near the visitor center, and started to flow over the first phase of the dike. Since the twenty-foot-high second phase started from the
Arizona
side, the section on the
Nevada
side, by the visitor center, was the last to be finished. For a half hour the team scrambled to keep up, and Fred had worried that the water would open a large gap and get ahead of them, but it didn't happen. The men stayed one step ahead of the water until the larger dike grew west and closed the weak point. Since then, the soldiers had been building the dike up to its full twenty-foot height.