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Department up in Estes Park at the mu.nicipal building. The date is Septem-ber 8, 1976, and my name is Davtd McComb. To start off with, when did you first hear that there was tr01.~ble _in th~ Big Thompson.

B: It was approximately 8:30 p .•. m. P.n _th.e ~ve.ning of July 31.

M:

Was it raining up heee!

B: It was raining and rainigg very h~r-c!.

M:

What did you hear?

8: We 11 , I didn't hear anythi n9. I happ_ened to be off at the time, and they got ahold of me at home, and I came down and got the posse lined up. I called for equipment out of the National Park. They responded with a Caterpillar and dump trucks an.d Joaqers_ and got roadblocks set up at that time.

M: Just out of curiosity, did you ha.ve kind of training or preparation for ,his kind of disaster work?

B: No, sir. We didn't up here. at this time. All I have up here is a posse, a sheriff's posse which is 13 m~mbers. __

M: Is that a motorized • • • ?_

B: It's a motorized patrol, four-w~_eel dri_ve patrol. M: And is that volunteer?

8: It's all volunteer, yes, si,r.

M: Do they train for mountain. resc.ue? . Or anything like that?

B: Not rescue, no. It's more of roadbl_ocks and looking for lost kids and fires, things of this nature. Jh~ National_ Park is trained for rescue which they helped with probabl,Y_ct,bQut 40 to 60 men, rescue people, starting early that next morning.

M: So they were able to gear up qu1ck1y._ B: Yes, sir. Very quickly.

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M·: Somewhere along the line yqu se.t JU~ .. a. ro~dblQck.

8: Yes. sir. We set up roadbl.Q.Ck$, .. ~~

t.he.

.Gltll'l Ha,v.en area and also in the Big THompson area. .., '~ ,..., .. ~· ... •• '~ -<; ••

M: And that was based on what~_ .. R~p_Qrt.s. _comi,n_g out of tl)e Canyon?

B: Yes. . ~ ' -, ··'

M: And who was sending in the .. repq_~t.s?,. Th_e .. r~sid~nts or • • • ?

B: We got our reports from the. _f~il.t Qf,f1,ce

1

f'! Fort Co 11 ins about how much damage it had done on down bel.QW, .an~ s.o o_n.

M: Did they instruct you down .:~he~ ,tQ .~.e.t .4.P .the roadblock!?· 8: No. We just automatically ,$_et .them J4P _tq keep_ people out.

M: And the National Park people. th,e_n w.e..nt in:to the Canyon and rescued people? 8: Yes. sir. The National Pa~k al')_4 _,t.he.n .. they .sent • • • the National Guard

came up •. and

we •••

the Stat.e. .Hfg~ay [Department] started moving in

·:-"11· .;..

heavy equ.tpment and so on, so ~e

..

CQ_ulq 9,Q,t a road partially to some of these people.

M: Even that night, you were t.h.ink.i_n.g a.bt>ut buJl.ding the road.

B: Well, no, it was the next ~nni.ng .w.he.n. --~ .••• real_ly at daylight when yo.u could see that most of the. J~o.ad w~s go_ne.. I mean, we knowed before-hand, but

we

just haddly coul~.n,'t. .. <J.o _anyt.h.ing._ By the time we got every-thing rounded up and stuff. i~ )Ia,~. next roqrning.

M: Okay. Were refugees and wh,~t-n,q~ •.. tict.i_ms, .coming out of the Canyon by then?

B: Ves. We was evacuating peo.ple •...• Qur o_ffi.~ers brought • • • which got mar-ooned • • • a car and a State .. P.a.t.r.ol _c~r d~n by Grandpa • s Retreat, and they wa 1 ked out forty some peop.,l,e .that; , n•xt day. And these peoJ 1 e was put u.p 1n the high school and also. Jn _th~ JllUf!.i.cipal building here 1n town. M: Did you have ·to arrange fo~ .tha,t;?, ~ .

(3)

B: No. The Chief of the Po11~e D~p~rtm~nt .a.r~anged for most of the • • • where do people go. They got the Cft1ef,of .Po.li_ce ••.• arranged to ppen up the high school and also the munic;,tp~l. ~-_i1~1,ng •.

M: So your job then was to man. _the, rQ,aq_blo.~~s .•

.

. .

B: Man the roadblocks and evac;.tA~te ,P_eople tha.t cou,ldn't get out of the Canyon.

Which, the next morning, the ~.ay .~f.ter,. _thE!re' s helicopters in here

evacu-ating people out of the Thompspn_,._ .. als.~ the ~len Haven area.

M: Were the helicopters com1nq .in f'!~~e~ ... Were they carrying people on down

to • • • ?

B: Well, they had a helicopter pad .. s.et l\P h.er.e by the Stanley Hotel. M: I see. So they were bringtn.9 s,om,e .of t.hem .right out here?

8: Yes. Few here. The bigges,t pe_r:~enta_g_~ o.f .the people was • • • around the

Drake area • • • was taken to .~o.ve.land 1nstead of Estes Park. M: Any of the injured come

out;

_he~~

B: Very few. Very few. Most .o.f th«a.m w:a.s .taken to Loveland.

M: So the bulk of the victims,, inj_u,re<t or o1;he.rwise_, are really going out the other way?

. B: Yes.

M:

Other than those,

I

guess, that. ~~l,ked out.

B: There was quite a few that .~1d .W,al~ o.ut .•..•. •. which

we

kept patrols on the road. We had our posse going .~s .. f,.r as. t~ey could go with four-wheel drive and so on • • • that was bringi_~g p_eople out all the time.

M: Tell me a little bit about :~_he t<t.ea .. ~eh1nd. the roadblock. You mentioned to keep people out.

Is

there ..

a.

.Pr.ob.l .. ell! .of J~eople trying to get in to some-thing like that?

B: Very, very big problem on S,(!l'let,lin,g

like

t_hat because all the sightseers want to get d - and see what ~en.t on ~r what'.s going on and just regualr

(4)

M: Well, it's kind of a funny s.ituation, is there no looting because you had the patrols out or • • • peoplejust don't do it?

B: Well, this .••• we had re.suc~ units, .we had about seven or eight rescue units from different parts of _Ge>lo~ado helpin_g us on this, patrolling. We had one from Weld County, a mq~nted posse which was of twelve men, I be-lieve, that I sent to Glen Haven .011 horseback. And everyplace you turned around, there was police offic.ers •. This is very hard to do, as long as there's that many men in the a.r:~a..

M: Sure. So there may be been no looting because you had them.

B: There was no vehicles, of c.o.urse~ (}nly emergency vehicles allowed down in thf! Canyon as far as they cou tcL_g,or,... . ~nd like I say, there was men on horseback and afoot also to Pr~v~n.t looting which, like I say, there was very, very 1 ittle of it. _ ... .

M: Of the people that you observed ,down i,.n_ the Canyon or coming out or where-ever you saw them, victims, was. ther:e any evidence of hJsteria. You know, a lot of people say in disast~ts people _get panic-stricken and that kind of stuff.

B: Very few that I • ve seen was. tha.t 't(ay. . I mean, of course they was upset because their homes were gone <an.d so 011, .. b.ut very little what you call hysterics that way.

(5)

M: Most people, pretty calm, ~h.en~ ... B: Yes, sir.

M: That's what I've heard from.els~~here _ • • • just almost no examples of people doing anything 11ke th~~· ....

B: Very few that I ever saw it'l the .. a~e~ •.

M: There's a.nother question that ba.s come u,p i_n all this business about the Big Thompson. That is would t,h.er,e h.a\fe been any way to warn the people in the Canyon that there was going to ~e ,a flash flood?

B: There's no way that I would, kno~ ... Qf Qf warn1ng the people. I just have no idea how a person would war::n .them o~ something 11ke that.

M: Just too quick.

B: Just quick, and it was gone,.

M: So I don't suppose there 1s ,a ~elephone sys~~m or a fire departmeflt system or anything 11ke that?

8: There's nothing down the C~nyon_,_ .no, si.r.

M: So about all,you could do i.s pick up the pi_eces. 8: That's about it.

M: During all this, where were you pers.onally? Were you here in the office? 8: i'~~w•s in the office, yes , s 1 r.

M: Coordinating '!hfngs?

B: Yes, sir, that's what I was.. trying to do •. The very next morning I got out on a chopper and flew the are~ ... ~nd co~. back in and started over the same thing agafn.

M: What did you see from the c,hoppe.r?

B: Well, just nothing, but ••.. • j_ijst lQQked like one big gully, in other words, one big river • • • miles of s.ectiq.n of the road was just clear gone, and then there'd -be a pi eee of it J~he~ '· .~n4 roaybe another two or three miles

(6)

there was no road on both the ,No,t:"t:h. F:~r"k and, _the Big Thompson •

: M: Well, since yau probably SP.~.nt -~~

t.ime

dQ~n tn there, that must have somewhat surprised you.

B: lup.

W!

Was there any problem of CO!l!flunication,_ that ,is, now you guys are up here

working on this end and the Sh~.J'iff' ~ Office and restoe units working from

the other end, how could you 9.~~ tog~ther" so you didn't duplicate?

B: The Colorado State Patrol s"~t a .c,o"""and post up by Baldpate Inn and this is the way we worked through t.~-~ Colorad.o State Patrol. All our radios here • • • we don't go through_t~e office .••• all our radios we dispatch out of here • • • all State P~tr.ol ra<,lios. So as far as having comunica-tion direct to our office, I d.i.~n',t ~a'{e _one.

We worked through the c~and post in loveland to this conmand post up here. When I needed anythif1g, _they called this command post, and they relayed it to Loveland.

M: Through the Colorado State" Patr-ol. B: Yes, sir.

· M: I assume it would be, in th.is s.it.~~t.ion,_ it would be better to have direct contact, but I don't hnow; may~e n~t_,, .maybe that wasn't much of a loss. B: Well • the phones was a 11 ou.t, of. . co.urse., .ctnd

we

had • • • I had no radio

contact with our office, no Ph.one.or not.hing, so this was the way we had to work it with the State Patrol comunication. · - . , . \ • • \> , •• ••••• •• •

M: Were you by and large worktng on_ yoqf' owm there for awhile?

B: No, they was within about ~ ..••.

J.

wo~:~l.d say 10 .or 11:00 the next day there was probably 8 to 10 State Pat.r:ol, u_p ~-..e.,, helping also on the road blocks and certain thing·s.

M: How about volunteers? We~ they .. a .~elp.? Bother?

(7)

was quite a few people that w~.sn'.t __ qu_al.ified _to do something like this. M: Right. So what do you do w1.th .1;~em,?

B: Well, I just told them that __ if

1

ne,.ed.e~ them, I would get in touch with them.

M:

In most cases, your guys would .~ave .~an.dl~d i~.

B: In most places, the rescue .IJnit~. a.nd th.e St.ate Patrol and ourselves handled

it. .. .. , ~ ...

M: Yes, did you have anythin_g J~o qo w.i~~ se,ttin_g up the list of people missing? B : No • I d1 dn ' t.

M: Somebody would have to do that .S()IJ!eP.lace along_ the line.

B: I think Chief Ault had some,~hing t.o d.o \O!ith. something like that, and also the State Patrol and our offic_e .c:Jown on t.h~ other end done this, too. M: And I assume the roadblocks are, .~till .Q.oing •.

B: The roadblocks are still goJng._ . I .f1av~ two men in Drake, and I have a man on each roadblock, Glen Haven _r,qa<Lar:td ~,ls.o __ the Big Thompson road.

M: At this point in time, it's _abo.l!t, .six _wee~s or so after the flood, five weeks I guess, do you think t~a~ the roadbl_ock is necessary? That's maybe kind of a sensitive question, _bu.:t. I .need a, .. Pilice ~view.

-B: Well, I think the roadbloc~s_ is _nece~sary n_ow, because of equipment working. M: Still a lot of work going O,fl? .

B: And there's still a lot of peopl.e. th.a~ want to get down in there and

sight-see. ,· .. ~ . '

M: Is that right?

B: There's nothing really to s.e,e no~_; .. a.s, f_ar _as th.e looting and so on, there isn't anything left, you migh~ .s..ay,, in._people's homes. I mean the people have been here; they've got o~t. a,l,l "~~eir _valuable stuff. As far as lootigg, there is.n't what they can get ,o.4t., but_ w~. h~ve to keep the roadblocks on

(8)

be-cause of equipment working. P_eo.Ple get ~own in there and get jammed up~ and they can't turn around or _no.t.hi~g else •

. M: Goodness knows, it's going to snow up here sooner or 1 ater. You got to

do what you can. Well, what about ,the ,bueiness down there. Is that just lost for the season?

B: Oh, yes. The businesses is .. lo~~-· . . A. .few m_otels up on this end, I'm sure

i>t hurt their business, but th,efr reserv~tfons and so on~ of course, was cleaned up on this end where 1:,hey c.Q.ild go ahead and operate. L fee I say,

I'm

sure they lost some custom,er~ •..

M: They're not going to be abl,e to .~o, anyt,hing about that this season. B: No.

M: l would think, too, that these roadblocks and so forth are going to be sort of long lasting. That is, the, effe.ct.s of this disaster may last longer than you might think so by reading t~e n~\yspapers.

B: Oh, I would say so. There'.s prqbab,ly,_ I would realize another three to ..<our weJks from here to Drake~ "~nq then there's going to be a decent road, you know, to then, so the residents and so on can get out, and then we can also patrol, get down, and th~. e,quipp1ent's going to be out of there where we can patrol back up through .G.l.en Haven and so on.

M: That disaster, then, put a kinq .of ~train .on your unit. You got to keep those roadblocks moving; you g,ot mf!n at Glen Haven and Drake, where is it? Glen Cove, or someplace else? ..

B: Well, Cedar Cove. That's s_outh. ,Qf Myer. There's two men on Cedar Cove and two at Drake and one on e~c;h .roadbl.ock.

M: That means that some of

your

m~npqwer th_at nonnally would be doing some-thing e)se • • • •

i

(9)

M: Okay. So those are some of your ~olunteers _t,hat are going to work for \\ you. Which brings up someth111g,

.else~

_,You _know, with a disaster going on

'\

·, and all your men, I suppose, t.~i.nk'Jf1g_ ~bo,~t that and working on it, what

- , , .

\

' happens to your other police wo..r~?. What h,a.ppens elsewhere?

B: We take care of it. I mean._, h~ve my ~wn regular men. This is what they're dctctng, the posse's handling th.e .r.o.~d_bl_o~ks. anc4 so on, and we handle our other calls. I mean, the reguJa.r roen. _of _shift which the government • . • see, in the sumnertime I have .~i_ght men,_ and the end of Septemller I let four of them go so there• s ju~t a. regular shift of four men. Now, they• re letting me keep on my whole S4111Jl.er .~r,ew.

M: I see. So that will help you. . ___ _ B: Yes.

M: Well, during the disaster i_tsel_f '· those _fi.rst few days, there was other police work to be done. Wher~'.c! t.ha,t ._ •. ?

B: We 11 , it seems very, very !$_tran,qe. _ Ther,e was very li_ttl e of it, to te 11 you the truth.

M: Is that right?

·B: I mean, as far as calls and. stuJf.. Jt ju$t seemed to come to a nil as far as calls coming in. That peopJe ~no~ed that we was working on this and maybe couldn't answer them whtchJ.t. wasn't ~ecause I had somebody on all the time.

M: Yes, but that gave you a ch_anc.e_ 'I;Q __ I.IS~ your me.n on the disaster. That's kind of interesting. •. ! "

B: Yes, it was very odd at the. _t111]~

:f.or.

a~ou_t a week there. We got very few calls about other things

or

SQ _Qn_, and_ we d_idn't have no burglaries

or

nothing. It was really someth.io_g. _,t\M_d I f_igured in my own mind that we would have a.lot of burglarie~ b~cause_ they knowed we was working all the

(10)

.· ...

manpower, most of it was on th,~. ,4..ts.~ster ~

M: Well, that's pretty good. .V.ou~ :~~l .. ephon,es ~.ent out and how long did it take you to kind of get back to ~.Q""al oper:ation?

B: Oh, f t took approximate 1 y a, ~e~!~ ~eek ~nd a ha 1 f. M: You guys were working long shif,ts.?

B:

Oh, yes.

M: What were you working? TW~lv~. h.~4.r:~J ..

8: I worked around--for the fi . .r:st _fo,~r .to five days I worked around 18 hours

a

day.

M: Did you g.et home and get any sle.~p .a.t ~1.1?

..

Change of clothes?

8: A little bit. That's about it.

M: Then, back on the job. Lo~~ of .R!~ssa.ges,, and stuff corning.

B: Yes, lots of telephone call,s an.cLi1JeS.$a_g,es,_ an,.d th~n I also give passes out up here to let certain peq,P.l,e. c,lown .in. the area, construction workers, and people that own homes. C~tn_g J.n

.here

_fr_om all over the United States, wanting to look at their home,

Qf

,c;o,4_rs.~. _and I i-ssued passes to them and

to the homeowners, and then w~.e.k ~ft.er:- .that we had crews coming in tr.ting t-o help people clean up.

M:

You got to regulate all that?

8: Yes. They laad to be all is .. suecLp.a.sses_ •. M: How soon did you put the Pa..s.s sy~te.ro Jn?. B: About two days we had the p~ss J~Y.s,tern •..

M: I guess the idea for that <;.~.me .. o~.t ..

Q.f.

th~ S.heriff's Office. Seems like a pretty good idea. Least you'r.~. go.1.n..g .. to r~gulate the tr:affic through there. Gett1.ng t.owards the end of th~. qq~s.ti,ons •. Do you think that by springtime JOU' re going to get back to a Jl.O.~a.l qp~ra_tion-.-that is the roadblocks will

(11)

B: I would say yes.

M: This' l1 take another four Qr fi.~.~ .rnonth_s maylte? B: I would say four to five mo.nths.

tor

_that?,

M: That does all kinds of nasty thinqs to budgets.

8: Yes, sir. I don't know ho"! the. .l:>.t.!.dget will CQille out as far as this goes, but I know there's a·~tot of e~J~ens~ •• diffe.rent things, like I have the

guys at Drake, and I've got tq_ J[!r,n1.s,h _them _the grocerf es and so on down

~tiere to live down there. ThecY..'.r:~ st_ayi_ng down the.re at the general store.

M: So you're going to have all .tha.~ •.. Yo~'.re going to pay those guys.

B: I guess the pay and so on i,s, CQ1111ng _o.u' of a disaster fund of the federal gove·rnment. I don't know how i.t'.$ ~eing paid.

M:

What about Estes Park? I IJ)ean, you live h~re in Estes Park,

I

guess. Did the disaster hurt it?

B: Oh, yes, I'd say the disas't,er hu_r,t 1t v~ry much. The motels, the businesses, everything, it hurt Estes Par~ •.... ,

M: You would have a feel for that .beca.use there are lots of tourists in town.

I sts.ose your police functirm, would, be • • • ?

·B: Qh, yes.

M: And if the tourists were out, yo_t,~ w0uld be sensitive to it. So your impres-sion 1s that the disaster did hurt the town. ·>.: • · ' ; ' - '· ' •

B: I.t definitely hurt it, yes., . Hu~.t .t.he ,Este$. Park area. M: And that's going to have a Jong-_ran_ge effect, too. B: Yes, I would say so.

M: Okay, one sort of the last ques~iqf). Aft.er having been through all this disaster work a·nd so forth, di,d ._it h.ave any kind of effect on you personally? Did it impress you one way or .. the qt,he.r, .about,. what they do? Maybe what should be done or should not ~e. d().n.e during disasters? What have you learned from

an

of th1s--any\h,i,ng?_.

(12)

12

B: Well, I learned that I neve.r wan_t to .90 through another one agifn, for sure. I've seen disasters befote ,and .I'.ve seen floods before, but not to this extent. I've seen flo_ods down _in _the lowlands which it flattens . out, but this thing, I've never se.en nothf.ng like this before. And I've

been up here 25 years, and I'v~ .n~vet: seen_ nothing like this.

Now, I worked Boulder Courty be.fo.re ,I came up here, and they dfd

have a fl o(ld severa 1 years ago_ .tn the --.~am.~stown area. I don't know whether you remembe·r1hat:·or not?

. M: Ves , I do.

B: But it was nothing like this..

I

mean,_ .noi;hfng ,_ I was in that too, it was nothing like this one.

M: 'This was much more severe. Is f,t tr.ue that the people that came out of this were almost either dead,

_or

,th~Y. were all right? There wasn't any mass injury.

B: No, there wasn't any mass tn_jury. Wha1; you call real bad injuries. They was either gone or that, or th,ey wa.s in good shape, I mean, one way or the other. That was ft. There w~sn'.t a,ny • • •

we

didn't have any what you'd call bad injuriea here on thi~. ttl1d •.nyw~y.

M: I'd heard that. Isn't that. str•n.ge_?

B: Yes, it is. I mean, it jus,t. h~P.Pf!.ne..d s.o qui.ck and so much force that they was just wiped out. I mean that's • • • • s ' . ~ ~. ., ... ·' .•.•

·-M: Or they got out of it some way._. . ...

B: Either that

or

they got up .on a_ ,hillside someplace

or •••

and set it out • • • they lived-- I can't .. t.e.ll you ~hy. . But there was no mass • • •

I don't know of anything. We ~fd have.some heart-condition people.

'M: Sure.

(13)

on th1 s end that \l/BS hurt.

'., · · M: So there wasn't any overloa.~ a1:

:tl'le

hospital or anything?

. ··.··· .. ·

B:

No •

M: That's really strange. B: It is strange, it fs.

M: Well, in the future • •·

.

.

. I~ yo~ ~ere ~o sit back and decide what to do in the future to prevent some~h.tng Hl<f!. this or !flake it less severe. What 'would you do?

lh I don't know much you coul~. do~ .Qnly ~Q n()t let the people build their homes back on the . • •

we11,

you mig_ht say on the river . • . like a lot of them was. But, as far as pr~ve.ntfng. I ~Oft't know much else you could do.

M: Yes. It's just too q•icl< a"d to .. • ••.•

B: Well, this is ft. Everythf.'19 happens t.oo quick. I would say that that flood, 15 to 20 minutes, and i.i; ~as do11e. You know, I mean, the big thing, I mean.

Of course

we

have little ,streams that _I've never seen run before coming off the mountains and s_tu~f.. , Th.~y'~e. still running! Where the water's coming from I don't l<npw. •. I .really don't. like the Crocker ranch out here, that big vallep. Th.~.t thi.ng's just running; I've never seen it running with water before, jus,t reg,ular Httle rivers coming down to ft [now].

M:

That's strange. Hive you been here_a good long time?

B:

I've been here

25

years.

M: Anything else you think

we

.~ugh'f; .. to put ~n this? .8: No, I don't know of anything.

M: Well, ·thank you very much. B: Yes. s1r.

(14)

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