Mulholland's career came to an end that night.

And poor dam keeper Tony Harnischfeger had reported a muddy leak a few hours before. They came and inspected, drove off, and by midnight, no more Tony.

Fault zone? yeah... that and fucking gypsum deposits!?! I mean... duh?

(For non construction people, Gypsum is a common material in modern construction. We know it as "drywall" for a reason as it is highly soluble in water- a nonstarter in a dam foundation.)

Dam

I mean, they built a dam on gypsum deposits; which utterly proved that man never deserved a career in the first place.

edit: upon reading more, in the words of the real life 'villain' of this story; "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."

Mastery is running out of ways of fucking shit up, and there is a deep honor in admitting grievous fault. This story is complicated.

TIL dying in your sleep isn't always the most peaceful way to go.

Yup, I used to live near that area. The ruins of the dam foundation are almost gone now. Not really much to see there anymore.

Is that God dam?

Thanks for the clarification!

There is way more to this story, the disaster, and the investigations that followed than you may know. There is no shortage of blame to go around:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Francis_Dam

Yes, Mulholland accepted responsibility for the disaster. And he should, as he was the final authority. But please read the entire article before making your judgement.

Really interesting read, thanks for sharing!

IIRC there were multiple leaks over a long period but they basically ignored them or made poor attempts at repair.

Does drywall get damaged by water?

I thought it was schist, not gypsum. Can you point me to where it says gypsum was the issue?

Can you point me to where it says they built on gypsum deposits? I can’t seem to find it and thought the issue was they built on schist.

Good little documentary: https://youtu.be/r8OSHlGfoL8

If you are found dead in your bed you "died in your sleep." That does not, at all, mean you were asleep when you died.

Stop these dam jokes

It becomes wet wall then gnarwall, not to be confused with narwals, then it becomes nowall.

I remember seeing a small documentary thing about this. So tragic.

I lived really close as well. There used to be pieces of the dam there, but they eventually destroyed them to stop people from visiting the site. Nowadays you can’t even tell there was ever a dam there unless you know what to look for. There’s a good documentary on YouTube about it that’s worth watching if you’re into that kind of thing. There’s also a local group that does occasional tours of the site.

I was on the 126 earlier Saturday heading out to Ventura. Very beautiful area- never knew of this historical tragedy.

Fuck. Imagine waking up to that.

I really appreciate you taking the time to research and ponder over your opinion, it's a rare sight to behold nowadays!

Pixies wrote a really cool song about it ❤️

You should go watch Chinatown

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Francis_Dam references to gypsum begin five paragraphs down in planning and design, noted on the eastern abutment. Then more in the discussions of the various failure modes as one of the investigations faulted upthrust on the eastern abutment. The western abutment is also listed as having veins of talc which is just as bad if not worse.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Francis_Dam The investigation section cites multiple contradictory investigations and the reasons for some of their bias (This all happened in the run up to the Hoover Dam and the feds were watching closely) but one of the later investigations points the finger at saturation and deformation in the east bank as a potential triggering fault. The fact both abutments failed while the center section stood is pretty phenomenal really, and suggests that neither abutment stood on a competent foundation; iirc the schist failed the western abutment (that and the talc), and the gypsum and clay deposits failed the eastern abutment.

Well it’s probably a good thing that they removed those. I remember teenagers climbing those, and falling.

Thank you! Small veins of gypsum and talc certainly wouldn’t help (and you’re right, talc is slippery and probably worse than gypsum). I’ve been to the site and the schist is clearly very friable at least at the surface. Thanks for expanding my knowledge on the site :)

Thank you!!! I’ve been to the site and climbed over to the western edge - the schist there is clearly weak. It’s hard to believe they thought it’s be ok :(

120 feet = 36.6 meters

Yes

God dam it

Sorry, silly American, here. ;-)

Frank Black did it solo. Gorrrgeous song. He’s got a lot of LA history in his solo work.

Thank you for sharing your experience of the site; Mastery is running out of ways of making mistakes, the true and best masters learn from others' mistakes. The St. Francis Dam was a wonderful theory. Engineering is the joke; what is the difference between theory and practice? well in theory nothing; now prove it.