89 Disaster

The disaster that would give Johnstown, Pennsylvania, a place in history began when it started to rain on the evening of May 30, 1889. All through the night and continuing all the next day the rain poured down, swelling creeks and rivers and filling the reservoir behind the South Fork Dam to overflowing.

At three o’clock in the afternoon of May 31, the Reverend Brown noticed the first break in the face of the old earthen dam and cried, “God have mercy on the people below!” The breach quickly widened, and the swollen lake of water in the reservoir behind the dam hurried itself into the valley below. The collapse of the dam was so sudden that the water surged downhill in a wall 30 to 40 feet high, crushing and carrying along trees, boulders, buildings, railroad cars—everything in its path. When the flood hit a stone bridge 15 miles downstream in Johnstown, the mass of wreckage jammed into a pile about 70 feet high, creating a treacherous new dam that caused the water racing behind it to rise and spread debris over 30 acres of land. Mercifully, most of the startled local citizenry went to their deaths quickly. They never had the slightest chance to evade a watery fate.

More than 2,000 people were killed in the Johnstown flood, making it the worst flood disaster in North American history—a record no one wants to see surpassed.

89 灾难

让宾夕法尼亚州约翰斯敦载入史册的灾难，始于1889年5月30日晚的一场降雨。雨下了一整夜，第二天也持续不停，溪流和河流涨水，南福克大坝后的水库被注满直至溢出。

5月31日下午3点，布朗牧师注意到这座旧土坝坝体出现了第一道裂缝，他喊道：“上帝怜悯下面的人们吧！”裂缝迅速扩大，大坝后的蓄水如湖水般涌入下方的山谷。大坝崩塌得如此突然，水流形成30到40英尺高的水墙冲下山，摧毁并卷走了沿途的树木、巨石、建筑、火车车厢——所有挡路的东西。当洪水冲击约翰斯敦下游15英里处的一座石桥时，大量残骸堆积成约70英尺高的堆体，形成了一个危险的新坝，导致后方奔涌的水位上升， debris 蔓延到30英亩的土地上。幸运的是，大多数受惊的当地居民很快就死去了，他们根本没有机会逃避溺水的命运。

约翰斯敦洪水造成超过2000人死亡，成为北美历史上最严重的洪水灾难——没人希望这个记录被打破。