The St Francis Dam Disaster | A Short Documentary | Fascinating Horror
Vložit
- čas přidán 21. 07. 2024
- "On the 12th of March, 1928, the St Francis Dam in Los Angeles County, California, failed catastrophically..."
As always, THANK YOU to all my Patreon patrons, who make all this possible.
/ fascinatinghorror
TRANSLATIONS:
► This video is also available in German ( • Das St Francis Damm De... )
SOCIAL MEDIA
► Twitter: / truehorrortales
► TikTok: / fascinatinghorror
► Suggestions: hello@fascinatinghorror.co.uk
CHAPTERS:
00:00 - Intro
00:50 - Background
04:31 - The St Francis Dam Disaster
07:46 - The Aftermath
MUSIC:
►"Glass Pond" by Public Memory
►"Underworld" by Myuu
SOURCES
►"On Occasions Like This, I Envy the Dead: The St. Francis Dam Disaster" by Matt Blitz, published by Smithsonian Magazine, March 2015. Link: www.smithsonianmag.com/histor....
►"St. Francis Dam Disaster: An Extended Timeline" by Alan Pollock, published by SCVHistory.com, March 2014. Link: scvhistory.com/scvhistory/stf....
►"The Last Victim of the St Francis Dam Disaster" by Alan Pollock, published by The Heritage Junction Dispatch, October 2019. Link: stfrancisdammemorial.org/last....
►"The 1928 St. Francis Dam Failure and Its Impact on American Civil Engineering" by J David Rogers, published by Missouri S&T. Link: web.mst.edu/~rogersda/st_fran....
#Documentary #History #TrueStories
"Don't blame anybody else, you just fasten it on me. If there is an error of human judgement, I was the human." Despite the horrendous nature of this disaster, I am very impressed that Mulholland owned it like this.
Same thing I thought. Mulholland took all blame even when there’s a good chance it wasn’t his fault, I went straight to the comments when I heard that line, wanted to see what people thought
Human needs to leave nature alone.
@@guineapiglady2841 Must be talking about human nature.
Agreed. So unlike most of these stories where the people truly are to blame but refuse to take any responsibility.
@@d.adrien7423 Nope. You silly.
Kudos to Mulholland for taking responsibility for the disaster. Many times, the higher-ups responsible for a disaster shift the blame, or diminish their own roles in the disaster. But Mulholland knew he was, at least partially, to blame for it. Taking full responsibility shows the huge level of integrity behind the man. I can't imagine the guilt he must've faced knowing his creation was responsible for such a massive loss of life. I hope he came to terms with it before he passed.
He was humbled, likely, when he saw the cracks and said: "It's not that bad" only for it to fail so catastrophically later... It is nice to see someone take such ownership of their mistake.
Well you see, therein lies the exact problem with all the regulatory shit-- it's always the next guy's fault.
This dude was the ONLY dude, and everybody knew it. He could either accept his own hand in it, or be come for. Thus, his humanity was OBLIGATED.
I find that that's when people ARE at their most "human"-- when it's in some capacity obligated.
More than one person with the same goal? Fuck you, get the hell out of my way. Neither can do it alone, or there's a high risk of death? Welcome aboard, neighbor!
I mean, we ALL agree it's the right way to be, yet most of us go our ENTIRE LIVES calling ourselves good people as we fuck each other over left right and center.
That is why I personally just cut EVERYBODY out of the equation. If I can't do it alone, it doesn't get done.
Yes !! especially since the science and information wasnt known at the time! he honestly followed all the rules available, poor guy, being responsible for so many deaths
He propably did it because he was self taught and had no company or position to uphold aside of his own.
So many times higher ups are taught to push away blame for the sake of their company, their workers, the prestige of their community, themselves etc. in order to protect them economically or from the wrath of the ones who suffered.
Which is understandable.
But an absolut pain and just as bad an action as failing in the first place
I thought the same. The integrity he showed was enormous. He was truly trying to help the people of the area. Although I think he could have had more compassion for the farmers, who made their living off the land and needed the water.
But, he did take full responsibility for the disaster, which is rare.
As someone else has pointed out in a previous video of yours;
It’s a very respectful touch removing the background music when speaking of the lives lost. No over-dramatization, facts of the disaster laid out, and great images. Excellent way to learn for the viewer.
Loves the signature Fascinating Horror background music!
This. So much this. We did it redditsisters
Yes it is a learning channel, indeed. If they had shit like this when I was in school in the 1960's, you wouldn't have been able to tear me away from history class!
I keep seeing variations of this comment under FH's vids, and I guess I just don't quite understand how a low-key moody ambient could be considered in any way "disrespectful".
@@lila2028 in the 1960s it would have been a slide show with a record playing the narration with a "boop!" sound to cue the next slide. Been there too.
I used to live below the wall of Somerset Dam in Queensland, Aus. Not as big as this one. I'll never forget the sense of immense power this structure emanated. The failure of such a thing is unimaginable.
Gidday! I grew up around there too, learnt to swim (sort of,!) In the dam, and I'll never forget standing on the wall as the spillway was opened to release pressure on the wall in the '74 floods. Literally awesome.
i used to go tubing at somerset dam all the time when i lived in aus, one of my favorite places as a kid
Somerset is small compared to Wivenhoe. I’ve seen both up close!
Bloodey hell I live in Adelaide ain't seen a dam there.
Crazy, I head out there sometimes but mainly to Wivenhoe. Can't imagine the horrors of a failure in the Dam wall
The huge piece of the dam that was left after the collapse that was called The Tombstone took one more life. On May 27th a 17 year old boy named “Le Roy Arthur Parker went to the dam site with his father, brother and friend. After climbing up the Tombstone to a height of around 30 feet… Le Roy fell after one of his friends tried to throw a live snake he had caught at him. Le Roy moved to avoid the snake and fell. He died a few hours later at a hospital. This was the event that made the county blow up the Tombstone some no one else could climb it. That area is still an intense place to visit. You can sense the feel of death even after 94 years.
Oh gosh that's just terrible! Thank you for this information.
Fell?
@@arianebolt1575 I meant “fell”. It was a typo… Unless he was pushed. 😀
The snake thrower was a shitty friend
What kind of snake did he throw at him?
Theres a photo of Mulholland looking out at the area the day after the collapse. I can only imagine the thoughts and feelings going on in his head at the time, but you can clearly see the pain on the man's face. Respect for him to take full responsibility of something like this though.
"I fu**ed up"
Thanks - I found a couple of pics of Mr. Mulholland at the disaster site. In one of the photos he looks like he's about to die.
Mulholland taking responsability, because he was the head engineer, is a rare sight.
Good man.
That's not something we get to see any more; now it's all finger-pointing and making excuses.
Now I know the origin of so many streets & places in California named Mullholland. I’m glad he had the humility to accept blame, but is it possible that his lack of formal education caused him to fail to foresee the limitations of this endeavor?
You mean the ditch digger that taught himself engineering? Your goddamn right it's his fault
I live near the former dam site for the St. Francis dam and have some knowledge of its collapse. This is an excellent presentation, though there are a couple of details that could use a fix. The 'tombstone' was demolished because a young thrillseeker had climbed it (as many others had done) and fell to his death. Also, a couple of contributing factors to the collapse of the dam were the use of sub-standard concrete during construction and the decision to add to the height of the dam without re-designing and widening the dam's base to take in to account the added capacity. After the collapse of the dam, documents/schematics were falsified to make it appear as though changes had been made to the base of the dam when in reality that had not happened. It was a good thing that Mulholland soldiered up and took responsibility for what happened even though some things were out of his control, but we need to keep in mind that he was not entirely blameless and he knew it.
Truth.
This one hit close to home. I was born and raised in LA, and I remember my grandfather telling me the story about it. They built another dam, the Castaic Dam, not in the same place as the St. Francis Dam, but not far from it either. There's a lot of housing developments in Santa Clarita downstream from it. Whenever we would go on road trips up Interstate 5, my dad would look at it and say, "I don't think I would buy a house under a dam so close to that other cursed one."
I do so know how you feel, every country town that I have ever visited or lived in has been hit by either fire or floods in recent years several of them were totally destroyed this life we lead is not for the faint hearted.
Reportedly the lower Van Norman dam suffered serious damage in the 71 Sylmar quake, and by mostly luck they were able to drain it before failure above a very dense population.
You are so right. If you drive the 126 west from there, as you approach Fillmore, they built two huge developments right smack dab in the flood plains... good luck with that.
Isn't that where Castaic lake is? It's really beautiful to see from up top the mountains. I didn't know a disaster of that magnitude had taken place near there. I'm also from L.A, but moved to the San Fernando Valley in my teens. I have to visit these spots now.
I don't blame Mulholland (even though the phrase "self-taught engineer" does inspire horror), he clearly did the best with the knowledge available at the time. I even admire how honorable he was in accepting responsibility.
I can't believe I never knew about this before. I read and watch a lot about engineering disasters, but this is literally the first I've heard about this event. The raw destructive power of water really is awe-inspiring. Since it occurred at night, I can only hope that many of those killed died suddenly in their sleep.
The experiments of self taught mathematicians, scientists, philosophers, astronomers and so on over thousands of years have shaped the world we live in today.
@@DaleDix - Yes.....but then there are situations like this. A self taught musician might not understand music theory, but not understanding load dynamics for a public works project is a whole different situation.
@@christopherweise438 it's hard to understand something before the knowledge is there...
Mulholland Dam and Mulholland Drive and two other places were named after him. Perhaps he was forgiven in the long term.
@@joshmitchell5654 - That's very true.....but he readily admitted fault before we knew about hydraulic uplift, and the soil profile of the area. That tells me he wasn't confident this was going to work. I'm not saying it was intentional negligence, but his apology almost sounded guilty.
Just my opinion.
I read the book Water to the Angels about the aqueduct, the dam, and Mullholland and it's really a fascinating story. The giant city of Los Angeles shouldn't exist and the fact that it does is largely down to Mullholland.
Came here to post this. We East Coasters tend to think of West Coast cities as marvels as nature rather than engineering (and it is bizarre that LA has a tar pit inside it, for example), but if not for engineering, these desert cities would never have flourished.
Any large city is essentially a space station. Without constant supply from the outside, be it food, electricity, water, etc., they can't sustain themselves.
Sadly, the lesson "don't supply Los Angeles with water" wasn't learned. Otherwise we may not have gotten that blight of a city which makes the lives of so many within it and the surrounding communities so miserable. It may have instead been a much smaller town with only as many residents as the natural resources in the area can comfortably support. Science has the potential to fix a lot of problems when properly applied, but it can also allow misery to propagate when its use intends to surpass the limitations set by nature which are as much obstacles as they are safeguards.
@@politenonparticipant4859 The residents usually live there because their families live there or their jobs are located there. No one is making them stay. I've had plenty of friends move out of California to their imagined "paradises" elsewhere. One friend--who has always been a "nervous Nelly" type--moved to Tennessee, and is now terrified of tornadoes and severe thunderstorms. Another--now forced to drive in snow for the first time in her life--has discovered that it's intimidating. A third lost her home in a wildfire in northern Arizona some years ago. No matter where you live, there's always some drawback.
@@politenonparticipant4859 Yes, today Los Angeles is a pox on society. What a shlthole. Even Bev. Hills has homeless.
Love how you approach these disasters, you do so factually and with sensitivity. Great video as always
czcams.com/video/4XS84FiFUUw/video.html finally it's here.
Sensitivity.... you know what's not sensitive? A giant wall of water falling and killing thousands
"Don't blame anybody else, you just fasten it on me. If there is an error of human judgment, I was the human."
Damn. Humbling to see such integrity and responsibility. Not many people would be brave enough to accept blame for such a tragedy. Imagine hearing about the dam failing within hours of deciding the issues were not urgent. I only hope he lived to realize that science had not advanced enough for anyone to have realized the dam was unsafe.
To take full responsibility for a disaster, one must have integrity, pride and bravery. Mulholland possessed all of those and more! At almost every disaster, you see all these cowards pointing fingers and making excuses, Mulholland did none of that and we should all respect him for it.
its the opposite of pride, dummy
Mulholland should have lived in a house downstream to prove the dam's safety.
This has to be a joke. Hes not a hero.
@@andyd3447 No one said _that._
He should have went to JAIL.
I first heard about this tragedy from Ask A Mortician's channel. Glad to find this covered here as well. Not many know about this.
Ah, the one titled "The Massive LA Disaster You've Never Heard Of"?
Which I didn't watch on principle, because, thanks to Tom Scott, I _had_ heard of it. 🙂
@@epiendless1128 Yes, that one!
She was much more in-depth than this!
It’s actually a refreshing take to see someone own their mistake as well as see a disaster that wasn’t caused by corporate greed or incompetence the man simply didn’t know
An interesting topic that isn't as well known that I think would make for an insightful video would be the Frank Slide disaster of 1903, wherein most of an entire mountainside suddenly fell apart without warning, and completely buried the small mining town of Frank.
I visited the site of the disaster twice, and the millions of tonnes of massive limestone chunks entombing the town is a harrowing reminder of the unpredictable and devastating power of nature.
I would watch a video or documentary about that!
Sounds like the Aberfan disaster.
As the narrator relates, there are still fair-sized chunks of concrete (with rebar visible) in the San Francisquito Canyon below where the dam was sited. If you're in the northern Los Angeles County area, it's worth a visit.
I live near that, and I'd love to see FH do it, too! I've been through there many times, and my fiancé and I always fall silent, looking up at what's left of the mountain. It's sort of eerie, but also respectful, that no one is allowed to move the rocks because there are still people buried under all that.
If anyone wants more info on this dam failure or even just want a different pov, both Caitlyn Doughty from Ask A Mortician and Plainly Difficult have done videos on it. They're both really good 👍.
Ah, I thought this was the one she'd covered. Her video on it is excellent.
i saw Caitlyns PERFECT lil story. (one of her BEST)
The Ask A Mortician video is fantastic! (As are all of her videos!)
Thank you! I'll check them out
All of the different videos from the various different channels who have covered this topic are excellent! It's such a fascinating & complex subject that you really can't learn enough about it...
The story behind the aqueduct and the resulting conflict between LA and the farmers of Inyo County is one of the stories covered in the American Scandal podcast.
I highly recommend it if you’re interested in hearing the history of how LA became so huge in the 1900s
In essence the fight that separates California into its Northern and Southern regions isn't a new thing. And the Northern Californians have been fighting for their water from their southern cities for over a century now.
👍
The movie Chinatown tells that story
Was going to comment the same thing, it was really cool to see photos of the project after listening to the podcast
@@mr.nobody2191 Just as long as you realize "Chinatown" was fictional, not biographical.
My alma mater, Toccoa Falls College, has a similar story, just on a smaller scale. In 1977, the dam above the Toccoa Falls failed, and 39 people died in the flood that swept through campus. There's a big monument at the base of the falls now, and the original warning bell still stands in the middle of campus.
This made me remember the disaster of brumadinho and mariana, two big disasters that happened in Brazil few years ago, in both cases a dam broke and mud and water flooded in a city, they were a tragic but very interesting cases.
I live very near St Francis Dam and it’s eerie seeing the remnants of that night of carnage. Haunting knowing so many lives were taken at this sleepy place.
On a side note, I never realised the aqueduct was also credited to Mullholland. I’ve only ever considered the aqueduct as “ooh! That looks like a fun water slide if it wasn’t deadly!” When driving past lol. Makes sense that it was a far more impactful part of Los Angeles.
I think those concrete devices in The Cascades are known as "bollards," and slow down the flow of the water. When we drive down the 5 Freeway, it's always "Is water flowing down The Cascades tonight?" They lighted The Cascades for a long time, but I don't think I've seen it lit for several years. It was always a beautiful sight at night.
Really enjoy the engineering focused cases. Even though it is also incredibly upsetting to learn about yet another way human failings (often greed) have destroyed yet more lives.
""Whiskey is for drinking; water is for fighting over."
- This quote has been attributed to Mark Twain, but until the attribution can be verified, the quote should not be regarded as authentic.
I'm kind of shocked that, as far as was mentioned, greed didn't play a role in this disaster.
@@jjdude5531 Yeah, this one was just insufficient knowledge and regulation. A bit less infuriating. Still, how was it ever not standard practice to consult geologists on such big and dangerous projects??
@@jjdude5531 "
"Whiskey is for drinking; water is for fighting over."
- This quote has been attributed to Mark Twain, but until the attribution can be verified, the quote should not be regarded as authentic.
@@jjdude5531 This video wasn't researched well enough. Greed DID play a factor. Go read the wikipedia, and the books about the disaster...the foundations were sub-standard and faulty.
Cracks appeared for days and days - experts tried to warn him. But Mullholand was an egotistical person who thought he was smarter than real experts.
He tried to "fix it in secret" for weeks and months. Ignoring warning signs. Evacuating people - meant loss of confidence in him, and fewer future contracts. He gambled that he could fix things without alerting the public - gambled with lives. GREED. Saying "oh the fault is all mine!" is not a confession. It was him, STILL thinking of his own reputation and how to salvage his legacy:
Even though he killed nearly 500 people.
Bodies are still being found every so often. That number is still expected to rise.
I like that you frame the disaster in terms of what we know about dams now vs what people knew at the time. Hindsight is always 20/20, and events should always be put into historical context before being judged
I never had an interest in disasters before coming across this channel and I think I still don't really have one. I watch every single videos though, because they are just that good. also, the music is so iconic.
Same, it's just good (if morbid) storytelling
I've always had an interest in disasters lol ever since I was a boy I used to draw 747's crashing.
Weird comment lol
@@chatteyj so, have you ever been on a plane despite all that past life trauma anxiety ? ;)
Was stunned to hear Mulholland took full responsibility, he and he alone. You don’t hear that happening too often these days. That said, Mulholland and Eaton did a lot of shady and illegal stuff in stealing water from CA farmers. So much so that the villain in “Chinatown” (1974) was based off of both these men.
Can you please do a short documentary on the flood of 1955 in Yuba City, CA that happened on Christmas Eve? My cousin was the Under Sheriff, Earl Blackburn, his son and a Deputy Sheriff Robert Tally, were killed trying to get the residents out safely. Thank you.
I like how this channel talks about stuff that i wasn't already familiar with and I've heard about a lot of disasters.
That’s one of the greatest aspects of this channel. I love the obscure horror stories. It’s why I cover topics similar to this on my channel. I really admire his ability to find new, interesting and obscure content. Great channel.
My grandfather, and his family where living in a shanty town along the bank of the LA river at the time. It worried his parents and they moved to another shanty town by the Hollywood hills. By the 1980s a vast majority of my extended family where living in the Hemet-San Jacinto area when a levee broke and the whole valley flooded! Not as deadly, but just as costly.
I live in Santa Paula California which is 30 miles or more down from where the damn was located. At our local cemetery you can see a huge row of tombstones that are dedicated to the lives lost here. I cant imagine what that wave looked like. Thanks for the amazing video!
Bardsdale and Piru have some too. Sad stuff. They found bodies in the Santa Clara river and as far down as Baja into the 1950's.
Hey, I live in Oxnard! Its cool to see some of our local history on this CZcams channel
Hey neighbor.. I'm on the east end of Ventura 🙂
@@shadowfigure3749 hey from Santa Barbara!
If you looked at a building, that wave would be at the middle of the second story windows.
I used to live just south of the aqueduct as a kid and LOVED driving by it on the freeway. It was so cool to look at and I always imagined riding down it like it was a waterslide 😂
I grew up in Piru California, one of the small towns devastated by the flood. There used to be a Shack at the edge of town that always stood empty, nobody really went near it. My grandpa told me that's where they stored the dozens of bodies when the flood was over
My Mother was born and raised in Piru ,l was raised there to she showed me the plots where dozens were barried her name was Mollie Ponce Ramirez
Were they buried at the cemetary? Or just somewhere in town?
@@daviddeltoro1808 no at cementary
This channel is almost at the million it deserves, great job!
He will be at a million in no time. Seems like just last week he was at 700k.
Good! I don't believe he's ever once said, "Like, share, and subscribe!" (that I know of), which makes him unique.
I watch ever week but I've never subscribed for some reason.
This channel is so darn good though. The choice of which events to cover, the storytelling, the narrator’s voice, the images shown … It is amazing how you manage to make every single video interesting without falling into sensationalism or disrespecting the people who lost their lives in these tragedies. Absolutely amazing work!
Dam failures are truly a nightmare. There’s no warning and I just can’t bear to think about it.
The good news is most dam failures actually have warning signs (seeping muddy water, cracks, more frequent landslides and/or earthquakes near the dam etc.) hours, days or even weeks prior to collapse. With more advanced monitoring system and better build quality (at least for the major dams in most developed countries), there are much fewer dam failures and subsequent life losses than it used to be.
I still won't live near a dam or in its downstream area though; while people could be evacuated in time, property loss is pretty much unavoidable.
Can you do a video on the 1992 El Al plane disaster that crashed into a residential flat?
Oh hey, this is the topic I emailed you about awhile ago! Thanks for replying to me, and cool to see a video about it now! I used to live in the area and had no idea about the disaster until I went on a hike north of town.
I grew up in the LA area. We have heard so much about the major quakes in 1933, 1971 and 1995, but NEVER about this, which dwarfs all those quakes in terms of toll of life as well as infrastructure... and I'm wondering why.
Maybe because it was such a huge loss of life, so much damage, so traumatic, that leaving it in the past, out of the conscience mind is easier?
@@reachandler3655 That may be true. But I realized it may also be related to the fact that the dam burst was a totally man-made disaster. Perhaps a subconscious burying of that reminder? (also, I mistakenly wrote 1995, I meant 1994)
The disaster didn't occur in LA proper; it occurred nearly 50 miles north, so it didn't impact Los Angeles directly (unlike the quakes). The damage occurred in an agricultural area and killed farmers, laborers, and migrant farm workers--not wealthy celebrities. And it occurred nearly 100 years ago--all of which are good reasons the disaster is relatively unknown.
Because it's man made. There is a reason this failed. Earthquakes are just tectonic plates
1994
I was just watching the civil engineering playlist when I got the notification. Thank you for what you do. I love your videos
czcams.com/video/4XS84FiFUUw/video.html finally it's here.
I never liked the idea of living below a dam.
Murphy’s Law.
Hearing of this disaster, and the Jones a town incident, just reinforced that belief.
Water is both a gentile and violent force.
Respect it.
Another excellent video. Once again, I liked your emphasis on the lives lost. Hadn’t heard of the heroic CHP officers warning the residents of Santa Clarita.
I’m sure there are people watching who will say that Mulholland should have ended up with his head on a pike, but you were conscientious in showing that he took responsibility for the disaster, and that he was working with the limited geologic information available at the time.
Great video. Could you cover the Seest fireworks disaster in Denmark? It was truly spectacular, and an example of a VERY well-planned evacuation that saved thousands of lives.
Great job of covering this disaster, one that I don't remember hearing about, which is surprising considering that it affected so many people in a larger metropolitan area.
it warms my heart that Mulholland stepped up and took responsibility. but it also warms my heart that they didn't bring him up in any charges. usually something like this is caused because somebody taking shortcuts or going cheap to save costs. to know that this wasn't the case and given the knowledge on hand he didn't make any bad decisions is actually a relief. sometimes bad things just happen
He might be the only person who has ever taken full responsibility for a disaster.
I know very well the powerful destructive force of a broken dam, here in the region where i live in Spain just before 2 years i was born, a dam broke and killed a lot of people in the towns nearby, even erasing an entire village from existence. My city was engulfed and my parents almost died, it was devastating, even pope John Paul II came here. I cant imagine the terror that these poor people had moments before they died.
This story reminded me of the Vajont Dam disaster which happened in the early 1960s in North-East Italy. The dynamics of the disaster were different, but the outcome was quite similar: a huge mass of water swiping away everything and everyone on its way. In that case, however, there had been several warnings that were ignored by the engineers and other people responsible for the dam. Perhaps it could be an idea for a topic to be covered in a future video
What a devastating disaster that I never knew about. You tell this story better, with more emotion, than the one-hour show on PBS I just sat through.
Thank you for your research and the way you present these horrific events.
10:18 an unfortunate note about the piece of the dam that survived - at least one death occurred from people trying to climb the concrete steps of the wall to get views of the countryside around them, and of course for the dark tourism it provided.
Quite a climb if those "steps" were five feet high (though the height may have varied).
We remember the past so we can learn from it, knowledge of historical disasters will only help us avoid tragedy in the future. Thank you for making these videos!!!
I am very impressed with the professional, respectful manner in which these stories of “historical horror” are compiled as to never down play or diminish the loss of human life. The painstaking research, and detail that go into each and every documentary is the very reason these are first class productions! Being a retired teacher of history, your explanation of how these events unfolded and dynamics involved that lead up to each individual mechanical/structural failure(s) would have been fascinating to have taught in the classroom setting. The integrity of the “self taught engineer” to accept full responsibility of the dam failure is beyond commendable. This series is educational, factual, and fascinating. This series is second to none.
This is why I like this channel, I'd never heard of this terrible incident before.
A very well presented video as always, done with respect for those sadly caught up in it.
In modern large engineering projects, there is usually a small group that bemoans the studies, cost and time it takes to get started.
They point to the past and remark how quickly projects were accomplished with less sophisticated tools.
The St Francis Dam is a good counter example.
any other engineer would have built it the same way back then
@@toomanyaccounts
I think that's his point. They weren't cutting corners to save time and money -- they just didn't have the tools and knowledge we have today. But people in modern times _are_ wanting to cut these corners, in spite of us now knowing better, because "It worked just fine then, so why do we have to put up with all this hassle now?"
@@eyesofthecervino3366 there is a lot of unnecessary regulations that can be removed and nothing would change except time being wasted would be slashed.
@@toomanyaccounts
Yeah, maybe so.
So, wait -- when you say "any other engineer would have built it the same way back then," are you arguing that that was indeed an acceptable way to build a dam? What point are you even trying to argue here?!?
@@eyesofthecervino3366 yes because it was the standards of what they knew back then with the materials and tech they had to build with. the terrain was the problem not the dam itself
Wow. The man just straight took the full responsibility. That like, NEEEEVVVERRR happens.
That is an enormous, rare amount of responsible dignity in one person.
Wonderful doco! Used to live in Santa Clarita and around Mullholland Drive in L.A.
From knowledge gained by your channel... it does not surprise me one bit that the one man who took full responsibility was not even at fault.
I always say that with every accident and every disaster, we learn something new that makes us more knowledgeable and safer.
There is a song about this called "The Saint Francis Dam Disaster" by Frank Black and the Catholics. It's such a great song, and where I first learned of this incident.
This is part of what became known as the California Water War. LA eventually found another way to store water by pumping it to an aquifer in San Fernando valley. Shady back door deals meant that some people became filthy rich from buying and selling the aquifer lands that became prime orange orchards.
The whole saga is the inspiration behind the movie China Town starring Jack Nicholson.
This the first time I actually hear this story be told outside of my hometown which is in the Santa Clarita river valley, thank you for bringing an integral part of my home's history to light
During the 2000's I lived in the area that the flood affected. School science and history classes take trips to see what is left and learn about the tragedy.
I always look forward to Tuesday’s for these videos. Keep up the great work!
A brilliant account of this very sad event.Thank you.
I just want to thank you for your channel! I study folklore and songs related to industrial era level disasters like this. Everytime a video of yours pops up I add it to my bibliography
You have one of the greatest channels on CZcams as far as disasters is concerned, and there is always a lesson in each one of these videos because after the situation they see the mistake and correct it. It's just sad that it has to be a disaster that has to take place for such a correction to take place.
Hey, first time I've been this early. Love the content man!
Same 😁
Tragic yet interesting history. Thanks for posting this little-discussed event.
I lived about 20-30 minutes where that dam collapse back in the 1920s. The town was completely flooded. There’s was an abandoned hotel turned haunted hotel that survived the flood that still stands today in the Santa Paula/ Fillmore area called the glen taverns inn. Driving through both the cities is a great day trip if you’re ever in that area. You can see how massive the flood would’ve been.
It's an amazing hike to take now, walking on the broken, overgrown roads and still seeing piles of the rubble. My wife and I did it last summer, its a very weird and haunting feeling. It was only a fifteen minute drive to San Francisquito canyon for us.
No survivors at all it shows just how deadly it must have been.
All those people caught unawares to boot…
That mass of water unleashed all at once... Only extreme geological shifts could have caused such a disaster naturally.
When disasters like this occur at night, it’s even more terrifying to me.
There were many survivors. If they grasped what that rumbling noise was and ran immediately for higher ground in the canyon, they lived. But just a few seconds' hesitation made the difference between life and death. There was the story of one family; the father told his wife to take their son and immediately climb the side of the canyon; he would carry their two daughters and be right behind her. She and her son made it, but he and the daughters were swept away. Another family's house collapsed and they were washed away as they sat on their mattress, only to be deposited safely miles away.
Also, the Santa Clara River Valley is very flat, and there WAS no "higher ground" residents could seek. At least two telephone operators sacrificed their lives by staying at their posts and warning as many people as they could. (In the days of shared "party lines," there was a sequence of rings that signaled an emergency, so everyone on the line would pick up.)
I live out here! My family and I hike the small trail out there often, it’s kind of surreal to see a road flooded and streams on the side huge beautiful trees and just seeing nature take over completely. There’s lots of little froggies too. There’s still signs and the typical street paint now mixed with graffiti. It’s kind of hard to walk down hill to the actual dam since it was blown to bits so no one would fall off of it again.
I have very good hiking memories there…especially with my boyfriend 😂
I have been watching your series of videos for a long while now and appreciate the concise level of writing and commentary that goes into these videos. Straight to the point, well written, and spoken stories about the horrid past with lessons to be learned and improved upon in the future. Thank you for sharing these stories. Keep the uploads going. Look forward to the next video.
I've read about this disaster in a number of books, but this put it in a new light, especially how quickly the dam failed after only a couple of years after completion
These videos are incredibly well presented. I know I'm only repeating what others have said, but there is no dramatization, just presentation of the facts, and no annoying background music. The narrator is well spoken with a clear accent.
As I was watching this, I was trying to imagine the full scale of the disaster. It's impossible - the sudden force of these unimaginable amounts of water, suddenly bringing death and destruction, to such an extent that bodies were found near the Mexican border - it's impossible to fully grasp this.
RIP to all the victims of this disaster - humans and animals.
Wow, this is the movie Chinatown. Life imitates art, or is it the other way 'round? The water shortage, the farmer's plight from lack of water and a dam failure. The water dept head was Mulholland in real life and was named Mulwray in the movie. Incredible story.
Wikipedia has a whole paragraph discussing the relationship between the plot and real events on the page for the movie
The fictional events in the movie Chinatown are based on the construction of the Los Angeles Aqueduct and the diversion of the Owens River water, but it places the fictional events in the 1930s instead of the period between 1905 and 1913, when the Los Angeles Aqueduct was actually built.
forget it Jake :)
@@quester09 it’s Chinatown.
Thank you so much for having captions available with the upload. My ADHD’s auditory processing troubles appreciate it
Visited the remains of the Malpasset dam in France a few years ago, it also failed due to water making its way around the dam's foundations. The size of the debris (some as high as 3-storeys buldings) and how far they were dragged, it's just crazy...
Another masterpiece by Fascinating Horror!
That shot you chose for when the wave reached the coast is thalassaphobic gold.
So glad you did this! I lived in Santa Paula for 15 years and have always been fascinated by this disaster. Santa Paula is where the motorcycle statues are and was one of the small towns mentioned.
I am taking an engineering class and my Prof allowed me to use this video for our online discussion assignments. Since Fascinating horror actually sights their sources its totally usable as an academic reference. [so long as your site your sources] I use to watch this for fun long before school. So it made for a super easy assignment. Thank you for doing such thorough work and making it entertaining to watch. I learned more from this channel and its sources then my teacher.
Respect to the engineer for taking the blame when so many others would’ve tried to shift it to someone else.
He killed hundreds of people..no respect at all.
@@G0DofRock Yes he made a catastrophic mistake that definitely haunted him for his remaining life but the fact he took responsibility is definitely respectable.
And either way as stated in the video the techniques and knowledge of civil engineers at the time of the dam’s creation wasn’t advanced enough to properly assess that the dam was going to fail.
You’re just lucky you live in an age where those who came before us made those mistakes so we don’t have to.
Someone actually taking responsibility for their errors has sadly become all-too rare.
As always Fascinating Horror excellent video! When I get a notification you have a new video it makes my day. Had to wait to get home from work to watch. I've watched every video you have. Keep up the great work and thank you!
Another brilliantly put together mini-documentary! Hats off to you, sir! It's a shame that some of the documentary creators on telly can't do as good a job as you seem to do on every one of your short documentaries!
As far as the content is concerned - I've read about this years ago, and remember feeling so sorry for Mullholland as he really didn't do anything wrong with his contemporary knowledge and expertise; yet he took full responsibility none the less. How many "big companies" would even say sorry for a minor disaster in this day and age?
Being the arquitect of a disaster that took so many lives....
Definitely feel bad for the dude and the hundreds of people who died because they didnt know any better.
Sad state of affairs really
@ghost mall even though this is one of the few cases were no one was to blame, you cant look at this and put the blame on anyone cause that requires looking at it with modern knowledge
It's worth noting that the body of the damkeeper was probably not recovered because he wasn't *in* his cottage. One of the last witnesses to see the dam that night and survive remembered seeing a light down around the base of the dam. He believed it to be the damkeeper, which has raised questions since about whether there was some warning of the impending collapse that night that the keeper was investigating.
There was warning in the days before. It was ignored by those who came to inspect.
@@TheHellFlower1 Yeah, that was established in the video. But there's also been speculation (based on the seeing of a light by a witness in the hours immediately before the collapse) that the signs something was wrong may have escalated that day, too late to make a difference.
@@jakual339 Any links to valid claims of said speculation and light? It is quite literally documented that something was thought to be wrong days beforehand, and nothing was done. Then, if you have seen the actual location and what went wrong exactly- you would have an "ohhhhhh" moment. Frankly, it never should have been built where it was due to geological aspects.
@@TheHellFlower1 It's in here:
czcams.com/video/r8OSHlGfoL8/video.html
Don't know why you're being so weird about this. Nothing I said in any way contradicts what you're saying.
@@jakual339 I don't know why you think that making sure history is being represented correctly is weird. Thanks for the link- one more bit. Take a breath, bud.
I just heard this story told last night on a different channel, you did a FAR better job. Even though I knew how this all went, you still kept me interested all the way through, very well done as usual! Makes me look forward to Tuesday mornings.
i am a new subscriber, you content is top quality, the buildup and asmosphere is very engaging
I love a dam disaster! And I love fascinating horror! Now that I’m watching this: I’m a Northern California native and there is still a TON of animosity towards Southern California for taking Northern California’s water to fill their swimming pools and water their lawns. 🙄 This issue is so contentious, to this day, that there are many who would like to split CA into two states.
Nicely done. You know I've seen two other videos on this and they both blamed him for not building the dam to modern standards. That seemed shockingly stupid to me so I'm glad someone addressed the obvious.
how could have built to modern standards when such standards didn't exist because engineers didn't know what we now know? any other dam engineer at the time would have done the same.
@@toomanyaccounts Exactly. Hence the "shockingly stupid".
I grew up very close to this area. It's very interesting. So glad you're covering it!
Wow, a disaster from where I live.
Not… entirely unheard of, actually.
A few things: a long stretch of road near where I live in the Hollywood Hills was named after this man, Mulholland Dr.
And, passing on the freeway from the main city in the direction of Valencia, where Six Flags Magic Mountain is, you can see where some of the aquaducts cling to the hills.
So many Johnstown Flood flashbacks.
This is why I have trust issues with water. Dams, ESPECIALLY bridges just make me so uncomfortable
I’m terrified of dams, large waves and whales.
Dam that's tough bro.
Awesome work here Fascinating Horror! Definitely one of my favorites that you have done.
That's so sad that they never found the bodies of that young boy or his father. :'(
A lot of bodies were never found; not just those two.
I wonder what happened to their bodies...
Love this channel - From Australia
**You should do the Thredbow Disaster..... avalamce at night, killing many tourists - 1 survivor**
Wait, there was a disaster at Thredbo? When did that happen? I'm surprised I've never heard of it
@@wilkaii Google it - its a sad story of buildings being decimated while people slept. Sole survivor is Stuart Diver - It happened in 1997 - let me know if you have more questions.... or google...
@@ausreflectindustries6107 thanks man, will definitely look into it!
@@wilkaii Are you admin?? I would be honoured if you shared the story - it's right up this channels ally - Keep in touch :-)
I’ve been waiting for this one. Well done.
A very similar catastrophy happened in France in 1959 : The rupture of the *barrage de Malpasset*
...and the similarities are quite shocking :
- modifications of construction plans, without a new geological study
- rupture during the very first full filling
- volume of water in the reservoir- approx 50 vs 48 million cubic meters
- number of casualities - 423 vs 435 dead
- gigantic chunks of the structure carried over 1 kilometre (still visible today, I visited the site last year)
Just woke up for work, nothing better to start a great day than an awful disaster