The Yellowstone Conundrum (19 page)

 
“Wow, incredible,” Denny shook his hand. “We need help.  Is your credit card system up?”

 
The young man looked this way and that, not quite like Beaker on the Muppets, but nodded no, but then yes. “We can process cards,” he said with assurance.

  “Excellent,” Denny nodded.
“I’m going to give you a five thousand dollar order in the next twenty minutes. I don’t care what credit card it goes on, OK?  Just come with me, write it up.  Here’s the card—go get it approved—either one, I don’t care,” Denny handed the clerk two cards.

 
“This building has electricity because of generators,” Denny spoke in a very quiet voice to Karen. “Somebody at REI is going to cut off sales because the cards can’t be processed. By the end of the day this store is going to be in shambles; nothing, I mean nothing will be left. The Wooblies will rip it apart. These people don’t get it.  They’re just marketers.”

 
He turned stone serious.

 
“Karen, can you ride a bike and carry a backpack?”

 
Karen replied dumbfounded at the question. “I’m not sure.”

 
“Maybe not here in Seattle where it’s so hilly,” he added, firmly.

 
“OK, yes, I can,” she contradicted.

 
Denny nodded, then grabbed the salesman and steered him to the bicycle section of the first floor. “This one,” Denny pointed to $554 Electra Rat Rod cruiser bike. “And that one,” pointing to a pink Electra Daisy model women’s bike. 

 
“Dude,” Denny confronted the salesman up close and personal. “I’m not going out of here with boxes. “This bike and that bike,” he pointed. “Follow me,” he indicated.

 
“How do you know so much?” Karen asked, trailing behind.

 
“When I was younger I spent a good portion of my disposable income at REI in Bellevue. I may not look like it, captured by Middle Age as I am, but I did a lot of hiking earlier on,” Denny stopped, and then looked around.  He saw that REI personnel were trying to close the store.  “We need to get what we want and get the fuck out of this store, quickly.”

 
Five minutes later the clerk had rung up two Lookout lightweight backpacks, a $400 Big Agnes tent, two lightweight sleeping pads, two four-season sleeping bags, an old-fashioned Whisperlite stove, fuel and canisters and whatever handfuls of handy things he saw that could be tucked away; a pair of water bottles, a Swiss Army knife combo.

 
“We’re just going to have to figure food out as we go,” Denny said, anxiously. “Here, let me sign,” Denny ordered the clerk, who ran the sale up as fast as he could, nearly totaling $4,500.

 
Bing, the sale went through; then there was chaos inside the store as store people began to yell back and forth.  Like a knife falling from a sheath with a silent whoosh, the sidewalk exploded as four ten-by-twenty pieces of glass fell from the sixth floor façade down to the street.

 
Denny squeezed Karen’s hand to tell her thank God no one was underneath. The sound of the glass crashing was like a thousand little wrong-way scratches on a blackboard by long-nailed fingers; enough to send forever memories to the brain.

 
Then the store managers went into shut-down mode.

 
Denny nodded to Karen, who quickly stuffed her packs with the items they’d purchased, or perhaps purchased; after all, who knew what was going to happen in Big Computer Land. All Denny cared was that they were going to get out of the store with enough gear to take care of themselves; wherever they landed.

 
The pair wobbled a bit on their bikes, packs in place, then carried their bikes over the massive expanse of fallen glass in front of the store, not wanting to risk a flat in the first five minutes.

 
“I’m not sure I’m up for this, Denny,” Karen huffed.

  “It’s OK.
I really don’t care if we walk to Oregon or California,” he didn’t try to hide his breathing issue, either. Behind them REI’s HQ store was closing down. 

 
The pair walked their bikes across the I-5. Beneath them the same people were trying to use the same phones to call the same people.

 
We’re going to Oregon?
She thought.

  “Karen, I’m really tired.
I’m hurtin’ and I really need to crash for a while. Can we find a place?”

  Denny was beyond tired.
Age doesn’t creep up on you.  It staggers out of the corner, knocks you down and says
you just thought you could walk straight, try getting down on your knees and back up again.  Go ahead, you just try
.
  Eight blocks away, out of breath and out of shape, they stopped at the corner of 11
th
Ave E. and E. Howell at the edge of Cal Anderson Park, named for the well-known legislator and activist. The park and ball fields spoke to the pair
come on in!
  The beautiful park, a green gem in the Capitol Hill neighborhood provided added value to city living.  

  It had been a tough morning.
The cold mist had turned to a light, cold rain; a perfect morning for sleep. Denny hurt all over. It was a perfect time to test out their newly-acquired equipment. 

  “It’s OK,” he said. “We’re going to camp here.
Nobody has electricity and the police are WAY too busy to evict us.  In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if this beautiful little park wasn’t packed to the gills with homeless by tonight.”

Yellowstone National Park

  What was soon to be the Great Yellowstone Volcano was in the infancy of its eruption, the caldera’s hymen now ripped nearly around to the top of the figure 8 of the park’s highways, soon descending to the upper and lower falls of the Yellowstone River.  Enormous, virtually immeasurable, amounts of debris spewed into the atmosphere.

 
Eighty miles to the south the Jackson Lake Dam had split right down the middle and was fighting an inexorable losing cause.  The waters captured from the snowmelt of the short but spectacular Teton Range were pouring—gushing—through, soon to cascade toward the Pacific Ocean.

Feeling like he’d been beaten with an ugly stick, BLM Undersecretary Robert O’Brien turned one last time to the sight of the Fort Peck Dam completing its death spiral as piece-by-piece the earthen dam succumbed to the inexorable forces of nature. Soon a half-mile stretch of the dam had collapsed. From the distance he could hear Missouri River roar with new power. His fingers and toes cold, he turned and started walking south as fast as he could on McCone County Road 24.

Watertown, South Dakota

  Dry-mouthed, Leslie Joe Abrams and Jerry Stockton at WAPA’s Upper Great Plains Power Control Center in Watertown, South Dakota looked at the multiple screens in front of them. Outside it was still colder than a witch’s tit, which should be the South Dakota state phrase.
Visit Pierre, it’s colder than a witch’s tit.
The pair had heard screams—not conversations—from the Fort Peck Dam.

 
“The dam’s going! Christ almighty! It’s going!” To which was added the punctuation of Klaxon alarms in the background, like the WWII movies where the sub had to dive to avoid the depth charge explosions. The conversations were one-way; nobody was listening to anything, only reacting to what was happening. People were going to die.  “Look! Jesus! Look!” shouted someone from Fort Peck. “It can’t! Shit, get out of here! Run!  Run!...Ru…” and the line went dead. Before the line went dead the sound was eerily like water rushing.

 
What was beyond scary was the immediate loss of electrical generating capacity to the grid.

 
“Did you see what just happened?  Fort Peck dropped off!” shouted Leslie Joe, whacking the best he could at his terminal, then rolling across the floor to the marketing terminal where red lights (led to white lights which led to power outage).  

 
“Oh, man,” groaned Jerry, his eyes on the large map in front of him. Fort Peck Lake was 135 miles long—roughly the distance between Washington DC to New York City. Further downstream was Lake Sakakawea, named for the Lewis & Clark babe. This lake is contained at Garrison Dam in Pick City, North Dakota; or as it is referred to by experts, the middle of fucking nowhere. Lake Sakakawea is one of the biggest impounded by man in the entire world; downstream was something bigger.

 
Like Fort Peck Dam, Garrison Dam is an earthen dam.

  Downstream from Lake Sakakawea is Lake Oahe, the largest impoundment along the Missouri River in Pierre, South Dakota; a dam that provides most of the power for the central United States. Like Fort Peck and Garrison dams, Oahe dam is an earthen dam, as are the other dams along the Missouri River.

 
“I’ve got a problem, Bubba,” Leslie Joe Abrams said, not exactly sure what to do. There were so many options.  Nobody had put a scenario in the training manual where the Missouri River dams were collapsing, and YOU, Leslie Joe Abrams, 53 of Watertown, South Dakota, come on down!  Leslie Joe Abrams had to decide which part of the United States was going to see the groundhog’s shadow and get six more weeks of winter. Leslie Joe glanced at his control panel which was wigging out; Kansas City Power & Light, Minnkota Power Cooperative, Nebraska Power, Interstate Power and Electric, Kansas City Board of Public Utilities, Tri-County Electric and more.

 
“Do something Joe!” Jerry shouted. 

  But, it was too late.
Like the ending in a computer game, all the lights went out. All of the electrical circuits had come home to momma. The panels went dark; the lights went out in Watertown, South Dakota. The lights also went out in Minneapolis, Topeka, and Omaha.

 
Inside the pitch dark Power Control Center Leslie Joe Abrams had four words to say.

 
“Oh, man.  This bites.”

The White House

  The Situation Room is located in the basement of the West Wing of the White House; renovated in 2006-7 to provide military, intelligence and civilian management access to modern communications systems to gather and analyze information during a crisis. Run by the National Security Council, after the renovation and post 9/11 emergencies, the Situation Room now also included the Homeland Security Council and the White House Chief of Staff.

 
“Water from the Jackson Dam is moving downstream at approximately 3 miles an hour, which is the only saving grace we have at the moment. It’s moving over relatively flat ground,” stated DOE secretary Abe Liebowitz. “I have no information on the dams in eastern Idaho on the Henry’s River.”

 
Others seated around the table were the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Director of Homeland Security the civilian Secretaries of Energy, Interior, and Homeland Security, the Director of FEMA; and the President. 

 
On the partitioned screens at the front of the room were large Google Earth maps of northwest Wyoming with overlays of roads and city names.  On the screens to the right were two Air Force satellite pictures, streaming video from space, the pictures clear enough to distinguish buildings and automobiles.

 
“In 1976 studies by various Federal and state agencies came to the conclusion that the Jackson Dam would be susceptible to failure if hit with an earthquake of 5.5 magnitude. Over the span of 20 years the dam was reinforced to withstand an earthquake of 7.5 magnitude.”

 
“Not an 11.2,” added the President.

 
“No, sir,” Liebowitz continued. “The Snake River exits Jackson Lake to the east, curls around Signal Mountain, and heads due south through farmlands. Although at high elevation, the terrain is relatively flat. In the space of 30 miles the river only drops 500 feet.”

 
There was a collective gasp from the elite audience as Air Force camera 1 showed the leading edge of the water as it encountered the first of a hundred loops in various stages of forming oxbow lakes as the Snake meandered through lush meadows; along the northern bank of the first loop ran US 191/287/29. Driving northbound was a delivery truck. The driver never knew what hit him. One moment there was clear road, the next he was hit by a six-foot wall of water. The truck smashed into the wall, turned to the right, then upside down and gone from view.

 
The DOE Secretary continued.

 
“In a few minutes the water is going to come to a large meadow, at the point where the Snake River heads straight south and the Buffalo Fork of the Snake heads east. This whole area will be flooded. After a short while the water will slowly make its way south toward Jackson which is 30 miles away. By six p.m. the streets of Jackson will be under six-to-ten feet of water.”

 
“What have we done to warn them?” asked the President, his mouth cotton-ball dry.

 
The FEMA Director, Anne Hastings, 58 from Knoxville, Tennessee; a former president of the Red Cross, gave the steely-eyed director of Homeland Security a meaningful look. In a soft voice she gave the President the bad news.

 
“Mr. President, in 1997 the Emergency Broadcast System was replaced by the Emergency Alert System; this system was designed to alert the public about tornadoes, floods—and for the President of the United States to speak to the public within 10 minutes of a disaster. Unfortunately, the nationwide piece of this program has never been implemented. It was thought by Congress that CNN, the Weather Channel and other commercial companies already were providing the public with needed information.” With obvious disdain for her own government, Director Hastings continued. “Now each state has its own Emergency Alert System, with its own regulations and rules. On paper this is supposed to be managed jointly by my agency, the Federal Communications Commission and the National Weather Service; which in essence. . .“

 
The President held up his hand indicating no more. This was another example of how a good idea had been sliced and diced by the politics of funding and inter-agency squabbling. In this case the elephants were partially or mostly right; too much government, too much duplication of service; the problem is, none of it actually worked, elephants or donkeys.

 
“So, if I’m in Jackson, Wyoming at this moment,” the President concluded. “Which has no electricity and no telephone service,” he paused, his brain flipping through the times he’d been there. Jackson was the home of expensive motels and fantastic views of the Teton Range.  The city square had an entrance gate constructed from elk antlers. The bars were noisy and good-old-boy establishments. “How do I know there is a wall of water headed my way?”

 
“Sir, you need to have a NOAA weather radio,” added Mrs. Hastings, semi-shrugging her padded shoulders. She paused.  “And the announcement has to be about the advancing water. I’m not sure where you tell them to go, sir.”

 
“We’ve never implemented the National Emergency Alert System?” the President asked.

 
“No, sir,” she paused. “Are you going to ask me--” Hastings started.

 
“Yes,” the President replied.

 
“Sir,” Hastings started. “This isn’t like your pictures from the Air Force. We may or may not have an actual person at--” Anne Hastings quickly typed into her laptop. “The sheriff’s office in Cody, Wyoming; in fact, I can pretty much guarantee that NOAA doesn’t have an actual person in any location in the entire state, perhaps with the exception of Cheyenne. Perhaps the Secretary of the Interior would like to comment.”

 
“Not yet,” replied David Jackson. “Mr. President, this is another example of how seemingly simple things have been screwed up by our government.”

 
Anne Hastings continued, her boss George Johnson of Homeland Security seated at her right elbow. “Plus the broadcast system uses equipment that is,” Secretary Hastings sighed. “Thirty years old, at least; teletype age,” she added. 

 
No interpretation needed to be added. This was another we-don’t-need-to-fund-it-because-it-just-won’t-happen situation.

 
“Anne, can you send a message to these people?” The President asked.

 
“From here, sir?” she asked in an
are-you-kidding-me
tone of voice.

 
“Yes,” the President replied, no-joke.

 
The administrator of FEMA looked to her left, then her right, a 180 degree view of Big Brass. She tapped and clicked on her computer; frowned, then nodded yes, then no as the screens
changed
.  Then she took her hands off the keyboard in a
what the fuck
gesture. She tried again and muttered something intelligible. 

 
“Sir, I’m apparently not authorized,” replied the head of FEMA. “I’m not sure why. Sorry, I am sure, sir. Our computers are at least two generations behind pretty much everyone.”  The President didn’t unload on her, instead buried his head in his hands in the futility of managing
The Government of the Low Bid Contractors in the Land of Abortion Funding,
coming to a Cineplex in your neighborhood.

 
The room was silent for a good 30 seconds.

 
“Abe?” The President asked his Energy Secretary.

 
“Yes, sir; the water from Jackson Lake is going to pause here at the junction of US 191, 287, 26 and 89; about thirty miles north of Jackson, or Jackson Hole as was it’s old name. The entire valley will be flooded. By this time tomorrow the town of Jackson, Wyoming will be under water or torn by moving water. There is no escaping it. Those residents who have access to emergency radio might—and say might—be able to out-run the water by going southeast on US 287 toward the southeast. It’s pretty simple; those who stay or don’t hear the word will be killed.

 
“The water however will continue to flow downhill.”

 
On the monitors from the Air Force recon satellites over North America, the delivery truck had disappeared, replaced by a fast-moving river.

 
“Approximately 17 miles south of Jackson, the Snake River meets the Greys River at the head of a canyon just west of the village of Hoback Junction, then turns west at the Idaho-Wyoming border at the town of Alpine. The area is known as one of the best white-water rafting in the country. The river then empties into the Palisades Dam Reservoir in southeastern Idaho.

 
“There is a stretch of ten miles between Hoback Junction and the village of Alpine where the Snake River runs close along the southern face of Wolf Mountain. If you were going to attempt to stop the water from Jackson Dam before it reaches downstream dams, some of which are earthen, like the first one at Palisades. This would be a good spot to create a landslide dam.

 
“Unfortunately, the next potential target is west of Boise in Hell’s Canyon along the Idaho-Oregon border.”

Palisades Dam, Idaho

Snake River Drainage Basin

US Bureau of Reclam
ation, Department of the Interior

US Army Corps of Engineers, 11 January 2010