Free Republic

Dramatic rescue from creek saves four children By Jeff Raasch and Erika Binegar and Erika Binegar jeff.raasch@gazettecommunications.com erika.binegar@gazettecommunications.com ANAMOSA — Along the shore of Buffalo Creek, Phillip Horak heard the screams of 2-year-old Tatum McGloghlin inside his car, upside down and almost fully under water. Just 4 miles from home on a winding gravel road, Horak had spotted a raccoon or a dog, jerked the wheel and was soon filled with regret. The two-door Honda, carrying his girlfriend, Holly Winders, and four toddlers spun off Buffalo Road and down an embankment. It flipped end-over-end, landing on its top in 5-foot-deep...

I know I've posted pictures of this place before, but the full-size version of this picture (unlabeled) gives me a weirdly vertiginous feeling. The source article is linked above; a click on the picture below will go to the full-size version. For those who haven't heard before, Medano Creek has a strange property (when it's flowing, mainly in the spring) due to the sandy bed; it pulsates. The sand bed constantly builds up little dams and bars, that break down with the water flow, sending waves downstream. An Ocean in Colorado? (note link to cartoon animation) Here's a nice picture...

THE BLUE PEOPLE OF TROUBLESOME CREEKThe story of an Appalachian malady, an inquisitive doctor, and a paradoxical cure. by Cathy Trost ©Science 82, November, 1982 Six generations after a French orphan named Martin Fugate settled on the banks of eastern Kentucky's Troublesome Creek with his redheaded American bride, his great-great-great great grandson was born in a modern hospital not far from where the creek still runs. The boy inherited his father's lankiness and his mother's slightly nasal way of speaking. What he got from Martin Fugate was dark blue skin. "It was almost purple," his father recalls. Doctors were so...