On this date ninety-two years ago, the St. Francis Dam — holding back a filled-to-capacity reservoir containing 12.5 billion gallons of water — broke apart. Three minutes before midnight, on March 12, 1928, the dam collapsed, unleashing a ferocious 140 foot tall wave of water that rushed down San Francisquito Canyon. The deluge turned westward and followed the Santa Clara riverbed, 57 miles to the Pacific Ocean. Over four hundred lives were lost, swept up and carried under in nightmarish finality. The victims will never be forgotten.
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