Wet Desert: Tracking Down a Terrorist on the Colorado River (12 page)

Before that morning, he had never seen the Bureau's jet. When he had approached it at the airport, the Gulfstream had glistened in the rising sun and looked brand new. He remembered hearing the scuttlebutt when the Bureau purchased it in the late nineties, replacing their older jet. Everyone at work was surprised that the government had funded it. And even now, riding in it, he wondered what kinds of shenanigans were performed to justify it. With federal deficits, how could the Bureau justify a 50-million-dollar-plane?

The story of how the Bureau of Reclamation had bought its first jet was legendary. In the 1960's, the haydays for building dams in America, Floyd Dominy, the most famous commissioner to ever serve in the Bureau, had asked for a jet and been denied. However, Dominy arranged for the cost of a jet to be buried in a dam appropriation bill in Congress. His bosses at the Department of Interior had been furious, but Dominy kept the plane. And over the years most of the other large government agencies had followed the Bureau and acquired jets. Since Dominy paved the way, commissioners of the Bureau of Reclamation, and whoever they wanted to schmooze, had flown in style, zipping back and forth between
Denver
and
Washington
DC
at five hundred thirty miles per hour.

Grant repositioned himself into the comfortable leather seat, which felt infinitely better than a coach airline seat. Travel on commercial airlines would never be the same after this trip. The Gulfstream was even more luxurious than he imagined. The first thing he noticed was the huge oval windows along the sides. They were much larger than anything he had ever seen before. And they looked more like clear glass than the milky plastic of a commercial airliner. An expensive lever lowered an accordion blind between the panes. The cabin actually felt roomier than a full-sized plane, which Grant attributed to the lack of storage compartments overhead, and the large and well-spaced leather seats. Grant ran his hand along the polished wood grain hand rests below the windows. He stretched his legs out. No problem. A seven-footer could ride comfortably in this seat. The plane was beautiful as well as roomy. It made Grant envy the lifestyle of his bosses.

He knew that this particular trip was an anomaly. Normally he wouldn't be allowed within a hundred miles of this situation. He could guarantee the commissioner and his entourage would take over as soon as Julia could arrange their early exit from the symposium in
Kenya
. The remoteness of the location in
Africa
, however, would slow their return.

As the plane climbed out of
Denver
, Grant looked west over the Rocky Mountains separating
Denver
from
Utah
. A few cumulus clouds floated over endless mountains. The view from the valley floor in
Denver
was misleading, and gave the impression that one only needed to drive through a small mountain pass to arrive on the other side to another open valley. But the view from above told a different story. The range visible from the valley was only the beginning. The mountains continued, peak after peak, for what seemed like at least fifty miles. Grant knew that if someone tried to hike through, without a compass to point west, he would end up hopelessly lost in the range with no hope of ever finding
Salt
Lake
and the Mormons.

The flight attendant tapped his shoulder. She held out a plate with a selection of bagels.

He nodded yes and selected one with onions on top.

She handed him a napkin, knife, and small package of cream cheese. "Would you like some orange juice?"

He nodded. "Sure."

He guessed she was in her thirties. She looked plain at first glance, but her smile changed everything. The perfect white teeth and sparkling brown eyes, in addition to her trim figure, made him wonder if she had been a model before. If not, it was only because she hadn't smiled enough.

She returned with a cup of orange juice,
then
sat on the arm of the chair next to him. "Hi. I'm Wendy."

"Grant Stevens," he replied.

When he first arrived, he was surprised to find a flight attendant at all. For some reason, he expected a big cooler on the floor, and executives tossing each other sodas and peanuts. Now the thought seemed absurd. When he cut open the bagel, it felt warm and fresh, making him wonder how Wendy could have had time to shop during the short layover.

"So how long are we going to be in Page?" she asked.

The question surprised him. It had never occurred to him that the plane would be waiting with him in Page. "I don't know. I'll have to figure that out when I get there."

The thought made him wonder what was happening at the dam. He looked out the window and decided the plane was at cruising altitude and he should probably make the call to
Glen
Canyon
. He asked Wendy if the Gulfstream had a phone, and she pointed to a compartment by the window.

"What are you doing at the dam? Do you have an important meeting or something?" she asked.

He looked up at her and saw mild interest, but no fear whatsoever. "Julia didn't tell you?"

She shook her head. "No. She just said to be ready to fly somebody immediately. I just figured . . ." Her voice trailed off, then he saw her brows furrow. "Julia didn't tell me what? Why, what's going on?"

He opened his mouth to speak, but was interrupted by another phone in the rear of the plane.

"Excuse me, please," she said, then quickly stood and walked back toward the rear of the plane.

While she was gone, he figured he better make the call. He leaned forward in his seat and searched in his right rear pants pocket for the card he used to scribble the phone number. He found the crumpled card and straightened it enough to read the number. Grant took a bite out of the bagel,
then
punched in the nine digits. Someone picked up immediately.

"Hello, this is Brian."

"Brian, this is Grant Stevens from the Bureau of Reclamation. How bad is it down there?"

The man sounded nervous. "Well, there was an explosion about an hour ago. I didn't see it, but I heard it. It blew the top out of the elevator shaft and a hole in the dam."

Grant wondered what could blow up the elevator shaft. None of the turbines were even near there. "What blew up? Do you have any idea?"

"Heck, I don't know. It must have been somewhere down the elevator shaft. Something blew. It seemed like a bomb."

For the first time since the call from Julia, Grant considered that the explosion might have been intentionally set. Until then, he had considered it an equipment-related explosion, but, if it were intentionally caused, then why? "You said there was a hole in the dam, Brian.
How big?"

Brian hesitated. "It looked pretty small when I first saw it, but now
it's
way bigger. It keeps growing. The water is really shooting out the hole."

Grant pictured water pouring over the top of the dam in a small cut, but Brian's description didn't make sense. "Where exactly is the hole?"

"It's in the west elevator shaft."

That wasn't what Grant meant by the question. "How far down?"

"About a third of the way, maybe two hundred feet."

The answer felt like a gut punch. Grant leaned back in the seat and rested his head against the cushion. Was it possible he misheard? "Sorry Brian, could you repeat that?"

"Two hundred, or maybe even two fifty."

Grant bent forward and put his head in his hands. This was much worse than he had imagined. The pressure that deep in the dam would--

Brian's voice rang in his ear. "Hello. Are you there?"

He rubbed his forehead. "Yeah Brian, I'm here." Grant hesitated at the next question, not too sure he wanted to know the answer. "You said the hole is much larger now, you said shooting out. Approximately how big is it?"

"You mean how big
is the hole
? I'd say let's see . . . maybe twenty-five or thirty-five feet."

Grant tried to picture the leak; he'd never seen a column of water that large. Actually, a thirty-foot column of water, no one on earth had, for that matter. How could there not be any casualties? "Did everyone get out of the plant?" he asked.

Brian's voice became low, almost a whisper. "I don't know
,
I couldn't contact them on the radio. I can only hope."

Grant pictured what amounted to tons of water falling another four hundred feet down onto the generation plants below. "Has the water destroyed the plant yet?"

Brian seemed to choose his words. "At first, the water shot out the hole so far that it cleared the plant completely. It didn't even touch it. By now, some of the water must be hitting the plant, but I can't really tell
,
there's too much mist down there."

Grant tried to picture the whole canyon filled with mist. "Are you alone?"

"I was alone in the visitor center, but
there's
a couple of my men at the upper access roads. Anyway, the cops showed up about a half hour ago."

Grant pictured a dozen police cars parked haphazardly. "What are they doing?"

"Mostly keeping people away, you know. But some of them are just looking themselves."

He imagined the spectacle and how temping it would be to just stand and stare. Grant wondered if he would be able to not stare after he arrived.

"Hey, I need to go." The security guard sounded anxious to get off the phone.

"Okay, Brian. I'll be there as soon as I can." Grant replaced the phone in the compartment.

Wendy was staring at him with wide eyes. "Is it bad?" she asked.

Grant sighed.
"Oh yeah."

"The dam?"

Grant nodded.
"Yeah.
Looks like somebody blew it up. It's breaking apart."

Her eyes grew even bigger. "Will people die?"

Grant considered the question. How could people not die if the dam failed completely? "Luckily, the area downstream of the dam was the
Grand Canyon
, for three hundred miles. Not a lot of people.
If someone could just warn them."
He hesitated,
then
looked down. "I'm sure some people will get hurt."

Wendy just stared,
then
her demeanor changed as she remembered something. She offered Grant about twenty pages of paper. "This just came in on the fax machine. It's from Julia."

Grant took the pages and flipped them around. The title page read, "DAM FAILURE INUNDATION REPORT, Glen Canyon Dam,
Arizona
." He scanned the table of contents,
then
looked up.

"Wendy, how soon will we be there?"

"We should land in Page in about fifteen or twenty minutes."

Not enough time to read the entire document. He started reading. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Wendy walk toward the back of the plane. After the second sentence, Grant skipped ahead, looking for paragraphs with numbers. Farther into the document he found tables that included flood depths and times downstream at various places in the
Grand Canyon
. At some point he realized he had been muttering. His stomach began to boil. He had to consciously stop himself from rubbing his forehead. Near the back of the document, he found an analysis of what would happen after all the floodwater from
Lake
Powell
joined with
Lake Mead
. It described theoretical water levels and their impact on Hoover Dam. Grant swore under his breath.

* * *

7:15 a.m. - Lee's Ferry,
Arizona
(16 miles downstream from the
Glen
Canyon
Dam)

Fifty-two-year-old Ted Johnson leaned upstream in the current and took a step to his left. He felt with his toes to find a rock large enough to act as a perch, but the rubber waders weren't the greatest for feeling around. He wiped sweat off his forehead for the third time in what seemed like the last minute. He was in serious trouble.

The morning had started out easy. He woke before the sun, and threw all his gear in the back of the pickup. Then it was just a short drive to Lee's Ferry. He always arrived early, before the rafters and other fishermen so he could be first down the windy road and grab the best parking spot, the one next to the river. Although he couldn't see the sun yet because of the steep canyon walls, Ted could always see the light from the sunrise on the rocks high above. That put Ted in the river right when those rainbow trout were just waking up and looking for their breakfast. And this morning, just like every other morning, he waded right out into the shallow river, staying close to the gravel strips. As usual, Ted had been overly careful to stay out of deep places. Any fool knew that you couldn't swim with waders on.

And for the first hour everything had happened just like any other day. By then he already had three big ones in his basket. But then, when he cast his bait over a nice green hole that was sure to be a virtual trout condominium, he felt the cold squeeze of the waders a little too high, up above his privates. It was a sure signal that he was too deep.