Wet Desert: Tracking Down a Terrorist on the Color

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Looking down, there was only darkness, an endless expanse of black water, water that might have been in Lake Powell only the day before, and now flowed into the Gulf of California. The fresh water mixing with salt for the first time in seventy-five years.

EPILOGUE

September 10

9:30 a.m. - Highway 89, East of Kanab, Utah

Grant had not been back to Lake Powell since the disaster over two months before. For part of that time he had not been allowed. The two-month stretch since the bombings would always be remembered by him as a period of high highs and low lows, a period when sometimes he hated the world, and other times he could not believe his good fortune.

The previous day, Fred had retrieved Grant from the Las Vegas airport for a day at Hoover, then a drive to Glen Canyon. Hoover had changed dramatically since June when Grant had last seen it. Gone forever was Hoover-Two and the thousands of sandbags that had created her. Gone were the high water levels. Gone were the throngs of National Guardsman. Gone were the FBI special agents in their blue coveralls. All of these had been replaced by a new white high water mark on the rocks around Lake Mead, a testament to the height of the flood that would last for generations.

To Fred's question of whether anything looked different, Grant had responded that it almost looked like nothing had happened at Hoover. Fred had laughed and took Grant to see the spillways. On the way to the Nevada spillway, Grant noticed that two buildings, the snack bar and the gift shop, both which had been on the water side of Hoover-Two, were missing. Fred had explained that the water damage had been severe enough that they would both need to be rebuilt.

The Nevada spillway itself had changed dramatically. The round spillway tunnel dropping into the hillside had been severely eroded. It was no longer round. The concrete had been stripped off the bottom showing exposed jagged rocks. The shape was almost square now, except for the bottom left, which looked like it had a deep tear in it. Deeper in the mountain, Grant could see more places where the concrete was completely gone and where large openings expanded beyond his vision. Inside the concrete retaining walls where Grant had authorized demolition, the ragged concrete edges had been worn smooth by the water. Only a small stream, maybe three or four feet deep, still flowed down the spillway, as the water in Lake Mead had almost dropped below the spillway openings.

Grant asked Fred if the Arizona spillway was worse or better. Instead of explaining, Fred drove him over. Although the erosion seemed less severe inside the spillway itself, the concrete arch bridge spanning the Arizona spillway had been weakened enough to warrant future demolition and replacement.

Fred explained that in a week or two, after the water in the dam had lowered enough to completely dry out the spillways, inspection crews would descend on ropes deep inside. They expected to find huge caverns hollowed out by the forces of the water.

After the tour at Hoover, the two men had headed northeast on I-15 toward St. George, Utah. The two-hour journey and dinner afterwards had given them ample time to rehash the events of the two dramatic days in June. Although Grant had known Fred for years, June had changed their relationship. They were bonded by the experience, and both knew they would be close friends for life.

During the conversation over dinner, Fred asked if Grant had heard from Roland Blackwell. Fred had smiled when he asked the question, knowing the answer. Of course he hadn't heard from Roland, nor would he ever. Roland and Grant had become bitter enemies in the aftermath of those two days. Fred had joked that they should make up and spend Thanksgiving together. Grant laughed and agreed that the only time the commissioner would be allowed in his home would be when Grant had a carving knife in his hand.

Back in June, when Grant and the others had flown back from Mexico into the United States, without the environmentalist, and had told their story to the authorities, federal charges were filed against Grant for illegal pursuit across international borders, illegal border crossing, and even abetting a felon. Although all charges were eventually dropped, Roland and the Bureau of Reclamation had placed Grant on disciplinary suspension while they conducted their own internal investigation. To add insult to injury, the Bureau had filed a restraining order against Grant preventing him from approaching within ten miles of any dam or edifice controlled by the Bureau of Reclamation.

As part of the suspension, Grant had been warned not to talk to any media representatives, or he would be immediately terminated and his pension would be forfeited. Although Grant had thought the treatment was unfair, he had tolerated it, thinking that eventually the truth would be known. However, when the Bureau publicly blamed Grant for the failures of Head Gate Rock, Palo Verde, and Imperial Dams, Grant had heard enough. In mid July, he agreed to a series of interviews on television to clear his name. He told the truth, including the Bureau's lack of support for Hoover-Two, which experts agreed had saved Hoover, Davis, and Parker Dams. Governor Rally Jenkins of Nevada appeared on Larry King Live and backed up Grant's story. The Bureau of Reclamation fired Grant in retaliation. Grant reported his treatment on national news. The public believed Grant. A media circus followed, and editorials around the country screamed for the government to throttle management at the Bureau of Reclamation. The Bureau became a public example of big bad government. A week later, Roland Blackwell resigned, saying that he wanted to spend more time with his family. The next day, Grant was reinstated at the Bureau, and the President of the United States flew to Colorado and held a press conference, publicly thanking him for his heroic efforts at Hoover and the other dams downstream. The helicopter flight into Mexico was never mentioned.

No, Grant and Commissioner Blackwell would never be friends.

After dinner in St. George, Grant and Fred retired to separate rooms of a small motel on St. George Blvd. They awoke early, ate a quick breakfast, then drove toward Lake Powell. They talked continuously and marveled at how the country had reacted to the bombings.

After the dust settled in late June, the environmentalists went crazy. There were parades in Las Vegas and Los Angeles. T-shirts were sold by the thousands. Many showed a picture of the Glen Canyon Dam being blown up by a mushroom cloud of fire. The Los Angeles Times and other prominent newspapers across the country showed a front-page color shot of some pelicans swimming in the restored Colorado River Delta in Mexico. Environmentalists dominated TV talk shows and speculated how fast the delta would recover. They hypothesized how many birds would return, and guessed at how many fish would nest in the delta next year and the year after. There were environmental theories in abundance and the media seemed willing to oblige them all.

By the fourth of July, a rumor took hold that the bomber had survived. Many claimed to have seen him. Some said he was short, some tall, but all described him as a skinny guy with a limp from his broken leg, both of which had been reported in the news. Some said that he was living in Mexico, but the majority opinion had him moving to Oregon where he was preparing to single-handedly do something to stop deforestation.

For the first few days after the incident, helicopters had flown grid patterns over the Gulf of California searching for his body. They found the four-wheeler, but not the environmentalist. The missing body fueled the rumors that he was still alive, but Grant didn't believe it.

By early July, the FBI had raided the RV storage facility in Page and confiscated the first white pickup. They had already retrieved the second truck, parked just off the highway in Mexico. From the two vehicles, they figured out the bomber's identity, which led them to cell phone records of the phones used to detonate Glen Canyon, credit card receipts for food and gas on the bomber's route, and a rundown house in East Las Vegas with traces of ammonium nitrate fertilizer in the back yard. They also found some unused homemade detonators in one of the kitchen cabinets. The license plate on a motorcycle parked in the garage matched one that passed through a roadblock in Utah the morning of the first bombing. They released the name of the bomber (more commonly referred to in the media as the environmentalist) as Jeffrey Calhoun, an electronics technician employed by a large lighting contractor in Las Vegas. Co-workers described him as a social recluse with no close friends, but very smart, especially with electronic devices. Neighbors described him as private. Most of his acquaintances were aware of his environmental concerns, and in fact many considered him fanatical. An elderly woman next door said that Calhoun refused to water his lawn, eventually converting the landscaping to cactus, and encouraged her to do the same. She refused, however, maintaining a healthy green lawn, which had seemed to irritate Calhoun.

At the public release of the perpetrator's identity, the environmental community vacillated back and forth on whether to embrace or vilify him. The Sierra Club, Greenpeace, and the Glen Canyon Institute all confirmed he had once been a paid member of their organizations, but that his memberships had lapsed. Greenpeace, in a widely attended and televised ceremony, announced an honorary lifetime achievement award to Jeffrey Calhoun and installed him into their hall of fame for positive environmental actions. The Sierra Club, on the other hand, tried to distance itself from him, claiming that they believed Calhoun was not the perpetrator, but had been framed by a right-wing conspiracy cooked up by the federal government. They had no explanation for why Calhoun had not been seen since those two days in June.