OCR Text |
Show FLOODSDAMAGE PROPERTY IN: NEVADAJOWNS Homes, Highways and Fields Inundated by Cloudburst,' at Bunkerville and Mes quite; Worst in 30 Years.- Suddenly and with but little warning, a great crest of ragingr water swept across the towi of Bunkerville last Friday morn ing, ruining crops, filling IiomeF-with IiomeF-with mud and killing swine anrl ' poultry. Almost simultaneously another -cloudburst struck Mesquite, did less damage although it washed wash-ed out a highway, but the ttrc floods converged, rushed into the Virgin river channel and. ruined work done so far on tins new $ US. 000 river bridge jot- The quickly formed desert' storm dumped tons of water from clouds hanging low ovei Bunkerville mountain about a. m. Rushing down the steep--slopes of the hills the water-found water-found its way from the smaller-channels, smaller-channels, widened out into the. -arroyos and fanned ' out over :.. half mile front. This formidable wave, froin one to four feet in depth, strucK, Bunkerville at 4:30 and surged' on clear across the town. The home of Gus Peiuleltoiv was directly in the path of ttiiF.-flood. ttiiF.-flood. Two feet of water swished' through his house and left twe,--feet of mud. Brush carried by the torrclii:' was swept against the fences; of the Tom Leavitt, Jr., ranch, thus forming a dam which failed::, to withstand the force of the -water. The fences were swept ' away and Leavitt's lawn was- covered cov-ered with a foot of sand- Otlirr-places Otlirr-places damaged were W. C. Row man's and Harmon Tobler's. The fields below town wert. inundated and as the water passed pass-ed off gravel and sand plastered," down the alfalfa and grain. It was estimated that one-third ot ' the crop was lost. The community of Mesquite fared somewhat better tliau Bunkerville, although a downpour down-pour north of the town rushed upon the village and washed owl ' some of the dips in the highway. high-way. One dip was cut througTa to a depth of four feet, wbilr-the wbilr-the waters filled another with-, four feet of mud and sand. (Continued on page 2 NEVADA FLOOD (Continued from page 1) Two young men from Chicago attempted to cross one of the washed-out dips, although they were warned not to. Tli3 vehicle stopped in the stream, and a second surge roared down, submerging sub-merging the car and making the escape of the passengers difficult. diffi-cult. The motor was ruined and the car wrecked. The Bunkerville and Mesquite floods converged through the natural slope of the terrain and with united force swept into the channel of the Virgin river just above the site of the new bridge. Temporary structures were washed wash-ed out and carried off and excavation ex-cavation for the abutment on the south end was filled up with gravel and silt, the coffer dam was swept away, the abutment forms crushed, and the excavation excava-tion for the first pier swamped. The steam shovel in use on ,the job was rescued after a frantic struggle by tiio workers. It was estimated that the monetary loss to the bridge would be $2500. The combined storm and flood was considered by residents of the Virgin river valley to be the most severe in 25 years, and reminded re-minded older residents of the famous and historic hailstorm cloudburst, which struck that area in 1906, in which windows were shattered by the frozen rain which pelted the valley. A flood struck Panaca earlier in the week and wrecked havoc with the little village. All the fields in the path of the flood were damaged and alfalfa destroyed. de-stroyed. Home owners who suffered suf-fered loss were Rex Mathews, Mrs. Mary Gentry, Clyde Mathews, Math-ews, Lafe Wadsworth and Clara Syphus. .The swirling waters also damaged dam-aged the Lincoln county high school auditorium and gymnasium. gymnasi-um. The loss was estimated at about $30,000. About two miles of Union Pacific track was washed out and railroad traffic tied up for almost two days. |