the year was 1928 and Californians were still asleep in their beds when a towering concrete Dam once hailed as a Triumph of modern engineering crumbled unleashing a wall of water that tore throughout the unsuspecting Valley entire towns were swallowed whole lives were lost in a heartbeat and the landscape was forever scarred perhaps the most terrifying notion about the event was just how fast everything unfolded the SA Francis Dam collapse remains one of the deadliest engineering failures in American history but what caused this seemingly Invincible Dam to fail so catastrophically was it a design flaw construction error or a deeper more unsettling truth the answer might shock you so stay tuned to find out as today we discover the history of the St Francis Dam collapse I'm your host Ryan soash and you're watching its history [Music] the heart of this story is water a simple necessity that historically speaking has always been problematic for California for Millennia seasonal rains carved their way through the rugged Sierra palona mountains feeding a small Creek that snaked its way towards the Pacific where ultimately it would dump precious freshwater into the sea in the area's early history human life thrived on a Natural Balance with scattered settlement drawing their water from this Source but by the early 20th century a different kind of thirst had gripped California the once sleepy town of Los Angeles was transforming into a vibrant Metropolis its population boomed fueled by sunshine and the promise of a new life however this burgeoning city faced a critical challenge water you see southern California is naturally Aid and the existing water sources were strain to the Limit enter William Mulholland a Visionary engineer who embarked on a daring project the Los Angeles aquaduct this colossal feat of engineering would siphon water from the Owens River hundreds of miles away to quench the growing thirst of Los Angeles but the aqueduct wasn't enough the city needed a way to regulate the flow of water and create a reserve in case of droughts or emergencies this is where the story of the St Francis Dam begins the race to quench LA's thirst left little room for deliberation in the design phase of the St Francis Dam so chief engineer William molland a self-made water Baron known for his bold vision and Breakneck Pace opted to adapt the blueprints of a previous Dam the mhall and damed this expediency however cast a long Shadow you see unlike the meticulously surveyed foundation of the M Holland Dam the St Francis dam site received a cursory examination the unforgiving terrain presented a complex geological puzzle steep Rocky slopes plunged into the narrow Valley and as if that wasn't bad enough their composition was a hodgepodge a fractured Rock and weak shell well a thorough survey may have Unearthed these underlying weaknesses the pressure to deliver water quickly trumped any such precautions and so many attest that the choice of the location itself stemmed from from a blend of practicality and M Holland's characteristic audacity the canyon offered a natural choke point where a relatively short Dam could create a substantial Reservoir additionally its proximity to the LA Aqueduct minimized the length of connecting canals saving both time and money however this seemingly ideal location masked hidden dangers the fractured rock beneath the dam site unseen and unconsidered would become a critical fact actor in The Dam's ultimate demise the design itself echoed M Holland's bigger as better philosophy and would Tower it a dazzling height of 205 ft but this size was not just to make Impressions rather it was intended to maximize capacity yet still there was a major flaw you see this towering ambition wasn't matched proportionally by the Dam's base well a wider base would have provided crucial stability it would also have required more Construction construction materials and time both of which were in short supply resulting in a design that resembled a concrete Goliath perched precariously on a foundation IL equipped it to handle its immense weight in this rush to meet an Ever growing demand the engineers at the LA Department of Water and Power were building not just a dam but a potential Time Bomb nestled within the rugged Embrace of the canyon in no time the Serene landscape was trans transformed into a beehive of activity workers cleared the land for the soon to be submerged Reservoir their focus solely on creating a clean slate for the water the ground itself underwent quite the makeover loose soil and debris were removed so as to not muck up the drinking water and the remaining Earth was compacted to form a solid base for the Dam's immense weight natural caves or other potential Escape Routes for water were meticulously plugged with concrete or grout then on July the 1st 1924 the same day M Holland was to submit his annual report to the Board of Public Service Commissioners Office engineer W herbet informed him that all the preliminary work on the dam had been completed in his report presented to the board Mullen wrote that the capacity of the reservoir would be 32,000 acre feet the dam itself Rose in a series of Rapid Fire concrete pores towering cranes hoisted buckets of wet material layer upon layer building a concrete Colossus that dwarfed these surrounding landscape and it slowly emerged when completed on May the 4th 1926 the stair step faed Dam Rose to a height of 185 ft above the canyon floor both faces leading up to the crest were vertical for the final 23 ft on the downstream face the vertical section was fashioned in into 24t wide sections a portion of these made up the spillway which consisted of 11 panels and total divided into two groups each Spillway section had an open area that was 18 in high and 20 ft wide for the overflows to pass the dam also had 53in diameter Outlet pipes through the center section which were controlled by slide Gates attached to the Upstream face and so it was the scaffolding finally came down revealing the St Francis Dam in all its imposing Glory but beneath the surface lurked a disquieting truth and unknown to everyone in the spillway the Hasty survey in the design shortcomings like the skimpy Bas meant that the dam was just a disaster waiting to happen and the true test the one that would expose its vulnerabilities was yet to come the filling of the reservo taming the San francisquito Creek was a calculated move in March 1926 water began its slow Journey towards the newly built Dam a canal diverted the Creek's flow channeling it into the base of the dam the process was deliberate a trickle compared to the Future torrent that the dam was designed to hold although several temperature and contraction cracks did appear a minor amount of seepage began to flow from under the abutments however by the protocol for design which had been established by the engineering department during the construction of the mhall and Dam no contraction joints were Incorporated the most notable incidences were two vertical cracks that ran down through the dam from the top one was approximately 58 ft west of the outlet Gates and the other about the same distance to the east M hullen and his assistant chief engineer and general manager Harvey Van Norman inspected the cracks and judged them to be within expect for a concrete Dam of this size by the beginning of April the water level reached the area of the inactive San francisquito fault line in the western abutment crucially some seepage began almost immediately workers were ordered to seal off the leak but they were not entirely successful and water continued to permeate throughout the face of the dam 2-in pipes were used to collect the seepage and was laid from the fault line down to the home of the dam keeper which he used used for domestic purposes water collected in the drainage pipes under the dam to relieve the hydrostatic uplift pressure was carried off in this manner as well then throughout the rest of May the water level was within just 3 ft of overflowing there were no large changes in the amount of seepage that was collected and month after month the pipe flowed about 1/3 full apparently this was an insignificant amount for a dam the size of St Francis and on this subject mhen said quote of all the dams I have built and all the dams I have ever seen it was the driest Dam of its size I ever saw in fact the seepage data recorded during the 1926 to 1927 period shows that indeed the dam was an exceptionally dry structure all the same this is where things take a suspicious twist as on May the 27th 1927 problems in Owens Valley escalated with the sabotage dynamiting of a long section of the Los Angeles Aqueduct in part of what became known as the California Water Wars California's water wars were a series of heated conflicts over water rights as cities like La boomed their thirst for water far outpaced their local supplies hence they looked to wetter regions like Northern California and the Owens valy to quench their needs this sparked outrage from residents in these areas who saw their Waters source as a way of life threatened by large scale diversions hence legal battles political maneuvering and even acts of sabotage became the weapons in this fight for a vital resource a second incident took place destroying another large section of the LA Aqueduct and as the tension escalated authorities became paranoid about critical structures such as dams in the days that followed several more sections of the aqueduct were dynamited causing a complete disruption in the flow meaning the near full Reservoir behind the St Francis dam was the only source of water from the north and withdrawals began immediately during this time the LA County Sheriff's Department received an anonymous phone call alleging that a carload of men were on their way to Dynamite the actual St Francis Dam within minutes officers were on their way and Personnel of the Bureau of Power and Light as well as the Bureau of Waterworks and Supply had been notified as well cars carrying dozens of officers from both the LA Police Department and Sheriff's Department rushed to the area although no signs of the threat that brought all this un materialized for many days afterwards the canyon resembled an armed enforcement furthermore from the perspective of today the documented attacks committed during the water wars makes the eventual fate of the Dam that much more confusing if not outright conspiratorial so let's have a look at the official record of how this history unfolded The Daily Record of high water elevation of the St Francis Dam shows that between May the 27th and June 30th alone 7,000 to 8,000 acre feet of water was withdrawn through June and July the Owens Valley fight continued as did interruptions in the flow from the aqueduct this in turn caused continuous withdrawals from the reservoir however in early August opposition to the LA water projects collapsed after the indictment of its leaders for embezzlement the city subsequently sponsored a series of repair and maintenance programs for the aqueduct facilities that stimulated local employment from here the St Francis Reservoir level Rose once again although not without incident in late 1927 a fracture was noticed which began at the Western abutment and ran diagonally upwards towards the center section for distance as with others Mulholland inspected the fracture judged it to be another contraction crack and ordered it filled with oom before it was grouted to seal off any more seepage at the same time another fracture appeared in the corresponding position on the Eastern portion of the dam starting at the crest near the spillway this crack ran downwards at an angle for about 65 ft before ending at the hillside it too was sealed off in the same manner both of these fractures were noted to be wider at their Junction with the hillside supports and narrowed as they angled towards the top of the dam the reservoir continued to rise steadily until early February 1928 when finally the water level was brought to within 1T of the spillway during this time though several new cracks appeared in the wing Dy and new area of seepage began to form under both supports near the end of February a notable leak began at the base of the wing Dy approximately 150 ft west of the main Dam discharging about 4.5 Gall per second the fracture was inspected by mhand who judged it to be just another contraction or temperature crack and left it open to drain during the first week of March it was noticed that the leak had approximately doubled in part to some erosion taking place and so Mulholland once again ordered an 8in concrete drain pipe to be installed the pipe led the water along the Dyke wall discharging it at the West abutment giving the hillside a very saturated appearance and the water flowing down the steps of the dam where it bordered the hill caused alarm among the canyon residents and others traveling the road about 700 ft to the east as at this distance it appeared that the water was coming from the supports directly on March the 7th 1928 the reservoir was 3 in below the spillway Crest and Mulholland ordered that no more water be turned into the St Francis Dam 5 days later while a maintenance worker was conducting his morning rounds new leaks were discovered this time on the west end of the structure concerned not only because other leaks had appeared in the same area in the past but more so due to the the muddy color of the runoff he observed this could have indicated that water was eroding the actual foundation of the dam and hence he immediately alerted Mulholland after arriving he found the source by following the runoff determining that the muddy appearance of the water was not from the leak itself but because it came from where the water contacted loose soil from a newly cut access road this new leak was discharging 15 to 20 2 gallons per second mulholland's concern was heightened not only by the leaks location but by the inconsistent volume of discharge according to their testimony on two occasions they watched an acceleration or surging of the flow noting the somewhat bizarre irregularity in their documents Mulholland felt that some corrective measures were needed though they were not urgent they could be done at some time in the future for the next 2 hours M Holland and and his crew inspected the dam and various leaks and seepages finding nothing out of the ordinary or concerning for such a large Dam with Mohan convinced that the new leaks were not dangerous and that the dam was safe they returned to Los Angeles so in summary filling this Reservoir took nearly 2 years and in that time it was threatened by the California Water Wars which had credible victims of infrastructure sabotage yet at the same time the structure was spring leaks left and right one way or another leaving those in the valley in a very precarious situation by March the 28th the water level had reached a critical point just shy of the spillway and then 2 and 1/2 minutes before midnight on March the 12th 1928 the St Francis Dam catastrophically failed there were no surviving eyewitnesses to the collapse but at least five people passed the dam less than an hour before without noticing anything unusual Ace hopwell a carpenter at Powerhouse number one rode his motorcycle past the dam about 10 minutes before midnight at the coroner's inquest hopwell testified he had passed Powerhouse number two without seeing anything there nor at the damn that caused him any concern however he also stated at approximately 1 and2 miles Upstream he heard above his motorcycle's engine noise a rumbling much like the sound of quote rocks rolling on the hill hopwell stopped got off his motorcycle and smoked a cigarette while checking the hillsides the rumbling had begun to fade and he assumed that the sound was a landslide a phenomenon that was quite common in the area from there he finished his cigarette got back on his motorcycle and just left to the best of recorded history hopwell was the last person to see these St Frances Dam intact and survive at both the Bureau of power and lights receiving station and LA and the Bureau of Waterworks and Supply at Powerhouse number one there was a sharp voltage drop at 1157 p.m. simultaneously a Transformer at Southern California Edison's substation exploded a situation investigators later determined was caused by wires up the Western Hillside of the San francisquito Canyon about 90 ft above the Dam's Eastern abman shorting given the known height of the flood wave and the fact that within just 70 minutes or less after the collapse the reservoir was virtually empty this failure must have been sudden and complete seconds after it began little of the dam remained standing other than the center section and Wing wall the main Dam from the west of the center section to the wing wall abutment at top the hillside broke into several large pieces and numerous smaller pieces all of these were washed Downstream as 12.4 billion gallons of water began surging down the canyon the largest whole piece of structure weighing approximately 10,000 tons was found about 3/4 of a mile below the dam site somewhat similarly the dam portion to the east of the center section had also broken into several large and smaller pieces unlike the western side most of these came to rest near the base of the standing section the largest fragments fell across the lower portion of the in structure coming to rest partially on its Upstream face initially the two remaining sections of the dam remained upright as the reservoir lowered water undercut the already underminded Eastern portion which twisted and fell backwards towards the Eastern Hillside breaking into three sections a dam keeper and his family were most likely among the first casualties caused in the initial 140 ft high wave which swept over their Cottage about 1/4 Mile Downstream from the dam the body of the woman who lived with the family was found fully clothed and wedged between two blocks of concrete near the base of the dam this led to the suggestion that she and the keeper may have been inspecting the structure immediately before its failure the remains of other family members were washed away never to be found again 5 minutes after the collapse the then 120t High flood wave had traveled one and 1/2 miles at an average speed of 18 mph destroying Powerhouse number two and taking the lives of 64 out of the 67 workmen and their families who lived nearby this cut power to much of Los Angeles and the surrounding Valley Power was quickly restored via tie-ins with scce but as the flood water entered the Santa clar riverbed it overflowed the river's Banks causing a whole new array of problems at about 12:48 a.m. se's two main lines into the city were destroyed by the flooding red darkening the areas that had earlier lost power and spreading the outage to other areas served by this company near 1:00 a.m. the mass of water then 55 ft High followed the riverbed West demolishing more substations along the way cutting power to the entire Santa clar River Valley as well as parts of Ventura at least 4 miles of the state's Main North South Highway was underwater and the town of K Junction was being washed away from there the flood entered Santa clar River Valley at 12 mph approximately 5 mil Downstream near the Ventura Los Angeles County Line demolishing a temporary work camp where A50 man crew were residing on the flats of the river in the confusion Personnel were unable to issue a warning and 84 workers perished then shortly before 1:30 a.m. the Santa Clara River Valley telephone operator learned from the Pacific longdistance telephone company that the St Francis Dam had failed she called a motorcycle officer with the State motor division who began contacting homes in danger the officer went door to-door warning residents about the imminent flood at the same time a deputy sheriff drove up the valley towards the flood with his siren blaring until he had to stop at Filmore the flood heavily damaged the towns of Filmore bdale and Anapa before ultimately emptying both victims and debris into the Pacific Ocean 54 Mi Downstream south of Ventura at what is now the West montavo oil field this must have been a very eerie sight at 5:30 a.m. as the sun was Rising by this point the wave was almost 2 mies wide and still traveling at 6 mph newspapers across the country carried accounts of the disaster the front page of the LA Times ran four stories including aerial photos of the collapsed Dam and the ruins of Santa Paula in a statement malland said quote I would not Venture at this time to express a positive opinion as to the cause of the St Francis dam disaster I arrived at the scene of the break around 2:30 a.m. this morning we saw at once that the dam was completely out and that the torrential flood of water from the reservoir had left an appalling record of death and destruction in the valley below Mulholland stated that it appeared that there had been a major movement in the Hills forming the Western buttress of the dam adding that three eminent geologists had been hired by the Board of Water and Power Commissioners to determine if this was the cause in the blink of an eye lives were lost moland's reputation was forever tarnished and the public they demanded answers following the St Francis dam disaster in 1928 numerous investigations were launched to determine the cause of the collapse several commissions were formed including those by the governor Los Angeles city council and County coroner most agreed on the Dam's faulty Foundation as the primary culprit you see the weak fractured Rock on the West Side led to instability the east side was also less than ideal due to an old Landslide causing a water pressure uplift to impact the already critical weakness the most common theory ALS also suggests a leak developed on the West Side followed by a domino effect the weakened Foundation crumbled the Dam's weight caused further collapse and the water pressure did the rest however Willis and grunky a team involved in the collapse investigation proposed a different scenario they believed the water seeped into the Eastern side lubricating The Rock and causing it to push against the dam additionally the wests side's rock swelled when wet squeezing the dam like a vice they asserted it was this Vice effect along with uplift that led to the Dam's failure no one will ever know for sure and there were also intense debates on the time frame leading up to the collapse some investigators believed increased leakage occurred beforehand While others disagreed there were also questions surrounding the structure having been a target of the water wars and years prior though these have been widely dismissed is conspiratorial the center section of the St Francis Dam which had become known as quote the tombstone became an attraction for tourists and svanir Hunters however it was toppled with dynamite in May of 1929 and the remaining blocks were demolished with bulldozers and jackhammers to discourage exploration of the ruins by the public the wing Dy was used by LA Firemen to gain experience in using explosives on building structures the dam was never rebuilt though bouquet Reservoir a nearby Bouquet Canyon was built in 1934 as an early replacement with additional capacity added with the completion of the Castaic Dam decades later in 1973 the exact number of victims remains unknown the official death toll in August 1923 however was 385 but the remains of victims continued to be discovered every few years until the mid1 1950s many victims were swept out to seea when the flood reached the Pacific Ocean and were never recovered While others were washed ashore some as far south as the Mexican border the remains of one victim were found deep underground near New Hall in 1992 the other bodies believed to be victims of the disaster were found in the late 1970s with the last reported victim discovered in 1994 so the death toll is currently estimated to be at least 43 1 initially mhal and seemed to struggle to come to terms with the situation stating quote this inquest is a very painful thing for me to have to attend but it is the occasion of it that's painful the ones I envy about this thing are the ones who are dead then in a subsequent testimony mhand spoke with honor in ways Unthinkable for the Elite Class of our modern day he added quote whether it is good or bad don't blame anyone else you just fasten it on me if there was an error in human judgment I was the human I won't try to fasten it on anyone else ultimately the coroner's inquest jury determined that one of the causitive factors for the disaster lay in what they termed as quote an error in engineering judgment in determining the foundation at the St Francis dam site and deciding on the best type of dam to build there and that quote the responsibility for the error in engineering judgment rest upon the Bureau of Waterworks and supply and the chief engineer therefore they cleared M Holland as well as others of the Bureau of Waterworks and supply of any criminal culpability since according to the jury neither he nor anyone else at the time could have known of the instability of the rock formations on which the dam was built the hearings also recommended that quote the construction and operation of a great dam should never be left to the sole Judgment of one man no matter how eminent Mulholland retired in disgrace from the Bureau of Waterworks and Supply on December the 1st 1928 his assistant Harvey Van Norman succeeded him as chief engineer and general manager in the end M Holland was retired as Chief Consulting engineer with an office and received a salary of $500 per month in later years he retreated into a life of semi-isolation passing away in 1935 at the age of 79 laid to rest in the Forest Lawn Memorial in park Lendale California and a very special thank you to the viewer who submitted this story idea actually I'd like to go much deeper into the topic of California's water wars and our members only live stream the archive so if you or anyone you know is an expert on that topic email me as soon as possible the rest of you can use that same address to submit your story ideas please be sure to include a small picture or other relative information with that being said I send you very warm regards from the heart of Poland until next time I'm Ryan soash signing off