The Day the Dam Slid
Fort Peck Dam is a Depression-Era engineering marvel in North-Eastern Montana. It was the first dam to span the mighty Missouri River and created the area’s most impressive feature, Fort Peck Lake. Construction started at the height of the Great Depression in 1933. At 50 cents an hour it provided employment to over 10,000 people. (By comparison, the current population of Valley County, where most of the workers lived is 7,437.) Many a local rancher, farmer and tradesman made it through the depression by working on the dam.
The U S Army Corps of Engineers was responsible for the project. Rail lines were laid to haul materials from far-flung quarries. The government built the picturesque town of Fort Peck to look like a modern interpretation of the old trading post it was named after. As construction workers poured in, shanty towns like Wheeler and McCone City sprang up. The nearby town of Glasgow boomed. So important was the project that President Roosevelt visited the site twice (1934 and 1937).
Jobs at Fort Peck were good ones. Unlike Boulder (aka Hoover) Dam where men dangled from ropes while drilling dynamite holes in the canyon walls, the jobs were relatively safe. That is until that fatal day on September 22, 1938.
Fort Peck was an earthen, hydraulically-filled dam. Four dredges were constructed at the site to pump a slurry of material into its core. The lakeside face of the dam was lined with large boulders, while materials like bentonite served to waterproof it. All went well for the first four years of construction. But on September 22, 1938, workers monitoring the stability of the fill noticed something amiss. As they checked and double-checked fill levels they noticed an apparent settling of the dam. An automatic warning system shut down the flow of slurry. Engineers scratched their heads. Suddenly the earth began to move. Cracks formed as the liquified slurry began to penetrate the outer face of the dam. Men fled in panic.
My Great Uncle, Ed Covey, was on the dam that day. Here’s his account of what happened:
“At one O’clock, Thursday afternoon, September 22nd, Grant, Ranney and I had just driven up to the East end of the upstream side of the dam. Morgan, Young and Sinks had gone on to the further station, leaving me to rod for Grant. I heard the rails clicking on the railroad and thought it was a train coming. Not seeing any train, I looked down where the rest of our party was working and they were running in all directions. I looked down towards the water in the lake, and it looked as though the lake was coming up on the fill. The rails from the track were bending in “S” shapes and the fill for approximately 2,000 feet was sinking rapidly. Men were scrambling toward each side of the slide where the fill was still solid. I could hear men screaming and the rumble of the rocks as they ground together and dust was very thick. Then I turned and ran with Grant and Ranney. The earth was breaking and dropping about a hundred feet behind us as we ran and the rails were tearing apart and together with the poles were flying through the air. We stopped by No. 4 Tool-House where we had left the truck. I watched Bill Sinks as he ran and jumped in his truck and then it was so dusty, I couldn’t see him any longer. Then we got in the truck and headed for the Fill Office.”
Edwin Covey
1947
The dam had failed in a massive, spectacular way. Material slid far out into the partially filled lake swamping one of the dredges. Of the 134 men working in the area, 34 were carried toward the lake by the sliding material. Most were rescued. Eight men died that day. Six of them are still entombed in the dam. A memorial marks the site.
Construction was halted as engineers struggled to learn what caused the failure. Ultimately, they solved the problem by making the dam’s base wider and stronger. Construction re-commenced in early 1939. The dam was finally completed in 1940 providing power, recreation and flood control to much of North-Eastern Montana.
Naysayers still worry about the stability of Fort Peck Dam. During the Cold War speculation held that the dam would be a primary target in the event of nuclear attack. It’s destruction could have led to massive downstream flooding. The historic floods of 2011 resulted in a record release of water through the dam’s spillway. This caused significant damage to it. It cost $42.9 million to repair the spillway and its associated systems.
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