Wet Desert: Tracking Down a Terrorist on the Color

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He realized suddenly that these two had not seen the detonators. They were not a threat, and he would not need to kill them. They were just a couple of curious campers, happy to be in the Grand Canyon for the first time. Regardless, the encounter had made him nervous. He needed to move away from them and clear his head. He wondered how to end the conversation. "Well, I better go." He leaned down and zipped up the backpack, lifted it onto his shoulder, and walked past them. He held the water sample carefully in his hand.

She yelled after him. "Okay, we'll catch you later in camp or something."

From behind, the skinny man heard the man say to his wife, "I don't think he wanted to talk."

"Really? Why would you think that?"

He walked upstream around a bend in the river, away from the couple, away from people, until he was alone and could see a mile upstream. His heart was still beating fast. That had been too close, he had almost done something stupid, something that could have jeopardized everything he had worked so hard for. He had carried the detonators with him because he was too nervous to leave them in the truck, and that had almost screwed everything up.

He gazed upstream. He tried to picture the dam. He couldn't see it, of course; it was almost two hundred miles upstream. But he knew what it looked like. The Glen Canyon Dam rose over six hundred feet and completely blocked the canyon. It trapped Lake Powell behind it, with houseboats, water ski boats, and jet skis, all buzzing around like bees, with over three million visitors per year.

What he had never seen, unfortunately, were the canyons themselves, under all the water. Only about a thousand people ever had, before the dam buried them forever. He read accounts of people lucky enough to have explored them including John Wesley Powell himself. They declared Glen Canyon one of the most beautiful places on earth. They described pink undulating sandstone walls, some striped, with rain forest-like jungles in some of the side canyons, and green fractures high on the walls nourished by seeping springs. The endless carved rock canyons contained lush overhangs and rock amphitheaters. But now it was all gone, forever. It made his stomach tighten every time he thought about it.

Instinctively, he knew that it would be impossible to build the Glen Canyon Dam or most of the other fifty-three Colorado River dams today. Environmental impact studies would never allow them. Unlike in the early 20th century, modern politicians feared environmentalists.

But, even though the government had stopped building dams, and society had decided dams were detrimental to the environment, they left the big ones standing. Now built, the dams were forgotten. Even the environmentalist groups like the Sierra Club or GreenPeace didn't waste resources trying to get rid of the dams. There were too many other issues brighter on the radar.

Not that the man hadn't tried. Over the years, he had made his rounds in all the major environmental groups including the "Glen Canyon Institute," a group dedicated specifically to decommissioning the Glen Canyon Dam and restoring its canyons. But he finally realized the groups were all pissing into the wind. The issue didn't even register with today's politicians. Since lawyers had won most of the legislative seats in Washington and taken over the House and Senate like a virus, no risks were taken, no big decisions were made, good or bad. The bureaucracy was impenetrable. Decommissioning the Glen Canyon Dam was a fantasy.

That's why, if it was to be done, it would need to be done another way. After much contemplation, the decision had been made. Preparations took over a year. The logistics were planned in excruciating detail. The Glen Canyon Dam would finally be decommissioned the next day, on Tuesday, June 22. The man would be there for the ceremonies. In fact, he would be in charge of the events. Because he was going to blow it up.

CHAPTER 2

2:00 p.m. - Lake Powell, Utah

Julie Crawford took a deep breath. "Hit it!" she yelled.

The ski handle in her hands jerked savagely. It felt like her arms were being pulled from their sockets. As her body dragged forward through the water, spray from the ski hit her directly in the face. She held her breath and closed her eyes as she always did. She could hear the roar of the boat accelerating. As the ski started moving through the water beneath her, she stood up in one fluid motion. The spraying water disappeared as the ski came up on plane. She caught her breath while the boat gradually accelerated to just under twenty miles per hour. She took a second to adjust her swimsuit. She could see the other five in the boat: her husband Greg, Greg's brother Max and his wife Darlene, and her best friends Paul and Erika Sanders. Julie's husband had a big smile on his face.

Julie leaned back and slightly right. The ski reacted to the wedge and skied to the right. She cut over the wake of the boat, absorbing the bump with her knees. Outside of the wake the water was as smooth as a mirror. She traversed to the right until she was at a 45-degree angle to the boat. She reversed her lean and cut back toward the boat's wake, spraying water behind her. As she approached the wake, she reversed again and cut back right, more aggressively this time. The water was incredible. Only Lake Powell had water this smooth in the middle of the day.

The hot, dry desert air warmed her body. She relaxed and adjusted her hands on the rope handle. She took a second to glance up at the rock walls of the canyon. She loved the atmosphere. On her right side, a vertical rock cliff climbed toward the blue sky. The canyon walls, with their astounding variations of texture and red color, contrasted perfectly with the blue sky and cool water. They were miles back in one of the countless side canyons of the lake. Although there were probably thousands of boats at Lake Powell, they had not seen anyone else for hours.

On Saturday, after picking up the rented houseboat, they had motored for hours upstream from the marina, towing the Mastercraft behind. They passed numerous canyons, but Greg wanted to go farther upstream where there were fewer boats. No one had objected. The leisurely tour up the lake had been relaxing. It gave the six of them time to catch up.

Paul and Erika Sanders had been the Crawfords' best friends for years. They met when both couples lived in Irvine, California where Greg and Paul worked as computer programmers. After being introduced by their husbands, Julie and Erika connected immediately and the friendship was sealed. When they first met, they were newlyweds, but over the years the Crawfords added two boys and the Sanders one girl.

Greg's brother, Max, was almost ten years older than him. Max and Darlene lived in Las Vegas with their three kids, the oldest being a teenage boy who was going to come with them to Lake Powell, but ended up going to Boy Scout camp instead.

For this trip all three couples had farmed their children out to friends and family. Lake Powell would be a vacation away from runny noses and diapers, at least until the kids got a little older. Besides, it was sort of a reunion for the two younger couples, the first time they had reunited since Greg and Julie moved from California to Phoenix in February.

During Saturday's trip upstream, Julie and Erika shared pictures of their kids and recounted stories since their separation. Paul and Greg talked work and sports as if they had never been separated. The older couple, Max and Darlene, both avid readers, dove into novels from a whole box they had brought. Julie told Erika about life in Phoenix and how it was different from Orange County.

All three couples had looked forward to the week at Lake Powell. When Julie first met Greg, he already had a ski boat. It was a lifestyle that she readily adopted. Likewise, Paul and Erika were easily converted, and the couples had vacationed together on every body of water that allowed water ski boats within three hundred miles of Irvine. Occasionally, Max and Darlene came with them. Once a year, they planned a big trip, and the last three years it had been Lake Powell. Lake Powell was a water-skier's paradise. At almost two hundred miles long, with thousands of miles of shoreline, isolated canyons, and red rock cliffs, it felt like a different planet.

Julie tightened her grip on the rope and cut back to the left. This time she did not stop at the wake, but cut through it. On the left side she cut back and forth, each time gradually increasing her aggression. After a while, she felt the muscles burn in her back and arms. She knew she could push harder, but then again, they had the whole week ahead, so she tossed the rope into the air and coasted to a stop. As her body sank down in the water, she leaned back, floating on her back and letting her head rest in the water. She took a moment and looked up in the blue sky at a solitary white cloud. It reminded her of an oversized bed, covered with white blankets, and big pillows. Something was perched on top of the bed, a harp maybe. Yes, that was what it was.

Julie deserved this. Like the thousands of other boaters spread out in the countless canyons of Lake Powell, Julie Crawford intended to make the most of her getaway. She would relax and purge all her stress. What else was there to do?

3:00 p.m. - Grand Canyon, Arizona

"RIGHT SIDE PADDLE! RIGHT SIDE PADDLE!" Keller screamed from behind. "Come on right side, we need you. DAVID, HELP OUT!"

It took all David's willpower to consciously reach his paddle ahead and grab more of the cold frothy water. His strength was gone and his hands were shaking. Where was Judy? A second ago she had been paddling just in front of him. Then the river had snatched her from the raft and swallowed her. How long could she hold her breath? Maybe she was dead. David blamed himself for organizing the trip, something he would now regret for the rest of his life.