The Hidden Springs Flood of 1978

Hidden Springs is a tiny community situated on Mill Creek, just off the Angeles Forest Highway. There is a ranger station there and, until the Station Fire consumed it, there was a small roadside café. In 1975, that area was where the massive Mill Fire started, so-named for Mill Creek. It was no small irony that in the huge floods of 1978 Mill Creek was the site of the worst loss of life when the community of Hidden Springs was virtually wiped off the face of the earth.

Mill Creek is a tributary of Big Tujunga Canyon. After the 1975 Mill Fire the creekbed above Hidden Springs filled with hundreds of thousands of cubic yards of debris from the denuded hillsides. Fire department engineers put out dire warnings to the 20 residents of Hidden Creek that any significant rainfall could cause the community serious problems. It was not until Feb. 10, 1978 that their warnings came true.

Despite a series of storms having dampened Hidden Springs, a structure fire broke out near midnight of Feb. 9. Volunteers and a firetruck fought the fire to a standstill, aided by a downpour at 1:30. Unbeknownst to the firefighters, that downpour had set the creekbed debris above the community in motion.

Amos Lewis was holding the firehose when suddenly the hose began pulling him backward. He glanced back to see the firetruck sliding sideways away from him. A fast-moving debris slug, a mix of water, mud and rocks, engulfed him. Amos struggled to stay on top and found himself suddenly in the bed of a pickup truck that was spinning down the flow. The truck shifted toward the bank of the creek. Amos saw an overhanging tree limb, jumped for it and pulled himself up.

A husband and wife were in the living room of their house when suddenly one wall dropped away. They ran in the opposite direction. The husband made it out and up the bank, but the wife slid backward into the debris flow and disappeared. Another family, trapped in their house as it filled with mud, was pushed against the ceiling.

One man was down by the structure fire. A Vietnam vet, he later said he heard the loudest sound he had ever heard, a weird rumbling sound. He looked upstream toward the sound and saw a 30-foot wall of water heading toward him. He watched transfixed as it hit a footbridge, tossing it high in the air. He turned and ran, but too late. The wall hit him, pushed him into a chain-link fence, then over and into a swimming pool on the other side. He survived. Another man watched helplessly as he witnessed his wife and two young daughters swept away from him.

Houses and trailers were swept clean from the small community. One house had been cut in half. Another stood but was stuffed full with rocks. Most of the little community, along with the bodies of 13 victims, disappeared into Big Tujunga Reservoir a mile downstream. A few remains were discovered there years later.

The next morning a news helicopter covering the disaster rescued the remaining residents while the Montrose Search and Rescue team was brought in to comb the wreckage.

One more victim was to be claimed the next morning by the storm. Bonnie Koploy was a popular community figure. She was chair of the Biology Department at Glendale College and was key in the fight to keep the Verdugo Mountains free of development. She was on a year sabbatical before starting on her doctorate at UCLA. The day after the big flood at Hidden Springs, several people had successfully crossed the Big Tujunga Creek at Vogel Flats, which had gone down significantly since the night before. Bonnie was with this group. She and a friend slipped on a rock and both were carried downstream. Bonnie’s friend survived, but Bonnie did not, and her body was recovered at Delta Flats.

The rainstorms of February 1978 were traumatic for LA. It was our 100-year flood but it can happen again at any time.