CEDAR CITY, Utah — A family is counting its blessings after encountering a damaging rockfall near Cedar City over the weekend.
“It just rained boulders. We just came around a bend and it started raining boulders,” said Jordan Armga, who was in a vehicle with her three children and husband. “Our toddler was sitting behind the driver in her car seat and the biggest rock hit right on her door; took out her door handle, but another 4-to-6 inches and it would have went through her window.”
Armga’s husband, Harrison, was driving when the rocks started falling into the roadway on State Route 14 on Saturday.
“Saw a couple of boulders come out in the road and then the massive one hit that other truck and exploded, and one of those hit the door of our car,” said Harrison. “I stopped and that’s when more boulders were coming down and I just floored it to get out of the way.”
The Armga’s were heading back towards Cedar City after spending part of the day checking out fall foliage. The other vehicle involved was driving the opposite direction and ended up colliding with a boulder head-on.
“It was a man and his son, and his son must have been 8 or 9 years old, just a little boy. He actually took the biggest hit, the little boy, because he was coming up the mountain on the side where the rocks were falling,” said Jordan.
According to the Armga's, the two in the truck were able to escaped any serious injury.
“It was a miracle, it was a miracle,” said Jordan.
Following the accident, the family said people immediately got out of their cars to help move the boulders from the road and check on people involved before law enforcement or emergency personnel could arrive.
“People got out of their cars. People just rushed out of their cars to move rocks," explained Jordan. "There was guy pulling a mini-excavator down the mountain and he pulled that off his trailer and moved the boulders out of the road before law enforcement showed up.
“There were just angels all around.”
While none of the seven people involved sustained notable injuries, both vehicles were badly damaged.
“They need to do something about that road, they need to figure out an alternative because someone’s going to get badly hurt,” said Jordan.
Both the Armga's noted a few potential solutions for the area to prevent instances like this from happening again. They suggested fencing, netting or additional barriers.
According to the Utah Geological Survey, published reports of landslides and rockfall activity have been coming in since 1949. Oddly enough, the incident this past weekend occurred on Oct. 8, exactly 11 years from the date of a massive landslide that wiped out the same stretch of road.
“That is an active slide area has been for years,” said Sgt. Scott Mackelprang with Utah Highway Patrol, who not only noted the date correlation, but acknowledged how busy Highway 14 and surrounding areas are this time of year.
“When you’re driving canyon routes, be aware of rocks that are piled on the shoulder and things like that that can be evidence of smaller rocks that have come down," warned Mackelprang. "That would be a good indicator that there are more rocks or larger rocks coming in those same areas.”
Because there are so many canyon roads and stretches that have similar characteristics, the Utah Department of Transportation patrols these areas to see if rockfalls have taken place and proceed to clear the area. Following each incident involving serious crashes, UDOT says that it evaluates those specific locations.
