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Show uu PATHFINDER DAM IAS SAVED Tho recent accident at tho Pathfinder Pathfind-er Dam, In which five men wero killed kill-ed by breaking of a cablo on tho norlal tramway across tho Platte river riv-er at that point, recalls another ovont which occurred at tho Pathfinder about three years ago, concerning which, little has eer been mado public. pub-lic. The Pathfinder dam is located near the headwaters of the North Platte river, about CO miles southwest of Camper, Wyoming, and the reservoir is estimated to contain moro water than anv other irrigation reservoir In the world; In February J 009, the dam was about 97 per cent complete. Tho snow fall In the mountain that wlntor had beou unusually heavv but In February It began to molt rapidly, caused by an unprecedouted period of warm, rainy weather and tho Platte, ordinarily not an unusually bad stream, began pouring pour-ing a volume of water down Its chnn- no! such as tho oldest inhabitant could not remember having seon Soon tho water In the reservoir began rising rapidly and before long the gauges on tho face of the dam recorded what had been estimated to be a maximum capacity. In tho mcantimo telegrams had been sent to Washington and Director Di-rector Newell and Chief Bnglneor Da-vis Da-vis of tho Reclamation Sen ice were hurrying westward. Project Engineer Apdrew Weiss, wjlh a number of the North Platto engineers, met tho party and all hurried to the dam where things wero In a precarious condition By tho time of their arrival the water was a little over three feet bolpw the top of the dam. It threatened to roach tho top, cut around the south end of the dam and brcak over a 'ow ridge into the valloy beyond. Should this occur a, flood of water would be precipitated into tho valley beside which tho Johnstown flood would have been insignificant and which would, In all probability change tho course of the river, leaving the dam isolated and probably take years of work to divert tho river to its original bed. A hurried consultation of the engincors was hold and the condition found to he thiB- Tho spillway gates at tho bottom of tho dam designed to carry off the flow of tho river after the wafr had reached a certain height In the reservoir res-ervoir were Inadequate to handlo the volumo of water rushing down tho Platte. Tho water on the Inner face of tho dam was rising at the rato of about two and a half inches an hour. As the engineers talked the waterj steadily rose until finally Chief Engineer En-gineer A. P. Davis decided. "Gentlemen," "Gentle-men," said he. "there is but one thing to do. The water must not rise higher high-er than a foot below the top of the dam, and when it Touches this point wo must bo prepared to dynamite the top of the dam." A profound sllenre fell upon the gathered engineers Men who had spent years In the construction construc-tion of the great dam and seen it rise stone on stone, foot by foot, now m fancy saw it crumbling before tho blast of dynamlto; saw the work of years crumblo before them, saw tho fiult of millions swept away But there was no alternative, so tho "hard rock" men wero summoned and set to work drilling holes along the lower side of the dam, into which about 400 pounds of dynamite was packed When oerythlng "was ready and the electric battery on shore connected, with which the charges were to be exploded, ex-ploded, the engineers went out on the dam for a final Inspection Tense, anxious and careworn were tho faces of that part, all of whom were In doubt as to what the dynamite might do to tho gTcat structure already under un-der a terrific pressuro from the water. wa-ter. Presently some one who had been watching a gauge cried out, "The wa. tor has stopped rising." For two hours the party stood and watched the water gauges and It was even so the water had ceased to rise Finally, Final-ly, after a little ovor two hours, during dur-ing which the water was stationary, the water began to slowly recede and the danger was passed. It was a near thing, for when the water stopped rising ris-ing It was a scant 18 inches below the top of the dam. Six inches more and the dam would havo been dynamited. dyna-mited. Though tho danger was passed the engineers realized that steps must be taken at once to avert the same trouble trou-ble in the futuro, and since that time a dike has been built along the ridge to the south of the dam. some fifteen fif-teen foot high, which will force the water ovor tho top of the dam long beforo there h any danger of Its going go-ing over tho ridge. nn |