They were awakened a little before midnight by a loud rumbling noise. They wondered what it was, but weren’t concerned enough to get up or move their equipment. Some time later, in response to a much louder noise, Bennett left the trailer to see about the children. Mrs. Bennett was right behind him. As she stepped out of the trailer, she felt a strong wind coming up. There was a great rumbling, whooshing sound, and as the wind reached hurricane velocity she saw her husband grab a small tree for support. The wind swept him off his feet—he hung on like a flag tied to a mast. After a little bit he let go and was blown away. She never saw him again. She couldn’t see her children, except one flying through the air. A car was blown by, rolling over and over, and she found herself swept along with the trees, the rocks, and water. [Illustration: The Bennett car—thrown out from under the huge slide onto the dried-up stream bed below. (U. S. Forest Service)] “When I came to,” she said, “I was jammed against a tree with a log on my back. I don’t know how I got out. I thought I was the only one of my family still alive.” Then, over the awful moaning of the boulders grinding and crashing and the sound of the tree trunks howling through the air, she heard the voice of her son, Phillip, calling. Slowly, painfully, in spite of crippling injuries, they dragged, an inch at a time, toward one another over the rocky, oozy bed of the river which the huge slide had instantaneously stopped. Highway Patrolman Stevens, who found them several hours later, noticed how torn their hands were from this agonizing crawl. That morning, in the hospital at Ennis, Mrs. Bennett told reporters, “They say my husband and my boys are dead, but I have faith. I know they will be found.” They already had been—dead. OUTSIDE WORLD The Montana-Idaho, Wyoming area where the quake hit is a big, sprawled-out area where it’s easy to get the feeling of isolation when everything’s normal—the roads open, the phone lines and lights working. In one shattering blow, the earthquake cut most of this area’s access and communication. Big sections of the Yellowstone Park roads were blocked by slides and boulders. The road north of West Yellowstone was impassable. Big hunks of the road between the Duck Creek Y and Hebgen Dam had crumbled and slipped into the lake causing four major breaks and several minor ones. The big slide formed an 80 million ton block at the west exit of the canyon, and at Wade Lake, road breakup had immobilized another group of terrified campers. For the first few hours after the quake, one of the biggest problems for the trapped was to get word out, and for those outside to get some idea of just what had happened. At the instant of the quake, the Berkeley seismograph showed shock in the West Yellowstone area.