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Welcome to Desert Journal Online, established in May 2001 in New Mexico. Our website offers our true crime book, Satan's Den Exposed - The David Parker Ray Story, and poetry and photo collections, Bombshell Liberation and Interference, and provides free access to our featured columns, photos and news archives.











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Last modified: April 25, 2009

…Indian Summer Turns To Winter

 A yucca stands amid the light cover of snow that fell over Truth or Consequences and most of New Mexico Tuesday night, Nov. 27. Click on photo to see another snow picture and more!

Headline News From Nov. 30, 2001

      Results of the Administration’s orders to beef up security throughout the nation are being felt in Sierra County.

  Having come from the lands of four seasons, I was truly amazed to see how truly unprepared this town was for winter, not to mention how fast it dropped into our laps this week.

T or C author Alan Hodgkinson’s
book After Incoming now in print  

  Alan Hodgkinson, author of Truth or Consequences, NM, has written his first fictional novel. His book After Incoming was released by Highbridge Press in September 2001.  

Click on Photo

    Then my person found a man who had an old dog, a blind hairless cat, and a young white cat, and we all came out here to live together.

Winter came abruptly before fall could settle its score. Here, a light cover of snow fills the strip between the Rio Grande and East Riverside Drive in Truth or Consequences.
Photo by Bill Johnson

Federal mandates affect Sierra County

By Carol Main of the Desert Journal

Results of the Administration’s orders to beef up security throughout the nation are being felt in Sierra County.

The Sierra County Emergency Management Office (EMO) has been told to include training techniques for the identification of chemical and biological warfare agents in its scope of operations.

Security also has been increased and tightened at all federal installations, including Elephant Butte Dam and power plant, operated by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation (BOR).

“I have just received guidelines on detecting chemical and biological weapons and I am now including them in the emergency management plan,” EMO Coordinator Dale Harrison said.

According to Harrison, after his office is contacted through the dispatch center about a suspicious substance he assesses the problem. And if it is a positive hazard, he then contacts New Mexico State Police and they kick it on up to the National Guard in Santa Fe for action.

“The guard post in Santa Fe,” Harrison said, “is one of the four locations in the state that is equipped to handle this new type of emergency.”

“We handle everything on the local level, with the help of the fire department and the city and state police, that we are capable of. And then we go to the state for help and if the situation is too big for that, the Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) comes in through the Emergency Operations Center,” Harrison said.

Galan Hanson, manager of the BOR power plant facilities at Elephant Butte Dam, said, “We also depend on the EMO for help. All of the agencies involved in the safety of Sierra County work closely together.”

“The main affect that the attack of Sept. 11 had on us here at the dam was to strengthen and tighten security,” Hanson said.

Elephant Butte Dam was built in 1916 to regulate the flow of irrigation water for the Hatch Valley Growers, Elephant Butte Irrigation District and the El Paso Water Improvement District No. 1.

Plus, the dam must release 60,000 acre feet of water annually to Mexico to comply with an international treaty between the United States and Mexico. The treaty is maintained and enforced by the International Boundary and Water Commission.

Funding to build the dam, when construction began in 1912, was split between the State Department, $4 million, and the boundary commission, $1 million.

“The primary functions of the dam,” Hanson said, “are still to comply with the international treaty and to regulate irrigation water, but secondary benefits now include accommodations for recreation and wildlife that are managed by the State Parks Division and these are good for our county,” Hanson said.

“The dam provides a lot of benefits to a lot of people and I am sorry that we must now restrict access to it, but my first concern is for the safety of my employees and the county and the orders to tighten security came from above,” he said.

<<<   >>>

Autumn was disrupted with an early winter snowstorm Tuesday night that put a mere inch or two of the icy slick stuff on the ground, as was the case along the Rio Grande off East Riverside Drive in Truth or Consequences.
Photo by Bill Johnson  

It must be winter

While highway department hibernates

By Vic Arvizu for the Desert Journal

 Having come from the lands of four seasons, I was truly amazed to see how truly unprepared this town was for winter, not to mention how fast it dropped into our laps this week.

Whether in California or Washington, a sure sign of winter was the clicking sound of studded tires on all of the local law enforcement vehicles, undoubtedly prepared for winter.

Last night seemed no different from any other night, granted it has been getting colder, but having lived in snowy environments before, this was not unusual.

As I sat here on the computer, talking to friends in faraway places, I was truly surprised at the events as they unfolded while listening to the scanner, scanning all of the police and emergency channels.

Shortly after dark about 6 p.m. Tuesday, I heard the State Police talking about blizzard conditions on the highway 20 miles to the north of us in Truth or Consequences, and which way the storm seemed to be heading. By 8 p.m. I heard them saying the blizzard was to the south.

Out of curiosity, I looked outside, since it seemed logical to me the blizzard would be here too. Sure enough it was. But nothing major, some wind and some snow, I would guess it was no more than an inch of snow.

The State Police were discussing the need for sand and/or salt on the roads to prevent motorists from slipping and sliding all over the “black” (invisible on the blacktop) ice, but they were unable to get through to the highway department for some reason.

Just before 10 p.m. I could hear the State Police say that the interstate was a sheet of ice on a 45-mile stretch of I-25 from the 65- to the 110-mile markers, T or C being at MM79.

They were asking about the possibility of closing the interstate since it seemed appropriate with the roadway being extremely treacherous by this time.

But they could not get hold of the powers-that-be to approve the closure.

It wasn’t 10 minutes later that the first vehicle rollover occurred. The fire department and ambulance were called into action for the first time.

The next several hours were hellish out there - several more accidents, vehicle rollovers, even a Sheriff’s Office patrol car was totaled by a large tractor-trailer north of town.

The ambulance with two passengers, already on the way to Sierra Vista Hospital, went back to get the injured officer too.

Still, there were more vehicles rolled, including the back trailer of another tractor towing a pair of trailers, and still not a word on the closure of Interstate 25.

It wasn’t until 1:30 a.m. Wednesday when someone finally got hold of the State Highway Department and it was determined that the Interstate would be closed from MM75 to MM79, with traffic routed through the town’s business loop.

But an hour later, still no closure, and another vehicle upside down. Our city’s police department and the Border Patrol finally closed the southbound off-ramp to the 75 Exit, since the Highway Department had not managed to get around to it yet.

I finally went to bed, but I have very little faith in the powers-that-be around here. Something needs to be done, before we have to endure another night of devastation such as this.

I also commend our local law enforcement agencies, the State Police, Sheriff’s Department, T or C Police Department and Border Patrol, as well as our fire department and ambulance crew for coming together in a trying time. These folks pulled together and went way above the call of duty, on a night that never should have been.

This community needs to get their stuff together, and at least get a better line of communication going between the State Highway Department and the State Police. When these trained officers are having trouble keeping their vehicles on the road, and feel the need to close the interstate, someone higher up - “The Powers That Be” - needs to listen up a bit.

I also think our local law enforcement needs to have their vehicles better prepared for this weather too. Studded tires would be a worthwhile investment. They don’t need to risk their lives anymore than they already do.

<<<   >>>

Alan Hodgkinson, author of Truth or Consequences, proudly displays his first book, After Incoming - a fictional novel about the Vietnam Conflict released last September – during a visit this week to the Desert Journal’s office. After an early retirement in 1997 from the federal government in Washington, he and his wife Akata had planned to move back to their Monterey, CA residence, but his folks - who had moved to T or C from the Sacramento, CA area in the early 1990s - encouraged them to come and stay in one of their houses (they had several rentals) for awhile and see what they thought of this part of the world. “We took them up on it, and eventually moved to Elephant Butte,” Hodgkinson said. “For several years we as well kept an apartment in Las Cruces because I did some part-time teaching and administrative work with the Border Book Festival.”
Photo by Bill Johnson

T or C author Alan Hodgkinson’s
book After Incoming now in print

Alan Hodgkinson, author of Truth or Consequences, NM, has written his first fictional novel. His book After Incoming was released by Highbridge Press in September 2001.

In the middle of actively protesting the Vietnam War in the late ’60s in San Francisco and Berkeley, CA, Hodgkinson, was drafted. The Army sent him to the Mekong Delta where he served as a rifleman with the 9th Infantry Division.

When he returned to his Northern California community, he was at first confused where he stood on the issues that divided our nation, concerning the war.

But after several years of seeing and personally experiencing the coolness toward homecoming soldiers that was so popular, his alliance with fellow Vietnam veterans became cemented forever.

A graduate of California State University, he worked as a photojournalist for several years, then enrolled in Colorado State University's Graduate Writing Program.

Afterwards, he joined the Peace Corps and was sent to Fiji, where he taught writing and literature at the University of the South Pacific. This is where he met his current wife, Akata.

Recently completing a federal career in Washington, D.C., Alan now lives in T or C where he spends his time writing. He also enjoys reading and traveling.

He has published many short stories and newspaper articles about the war since returning in 1969. The following four paragraphs are from his new book:

Those AK-47 toting little men should have remained back in the Mekong Delta where Ron Oriel left them over two years ago. But like the shrapnel he still carries around in his left leg, too deeply embedded for doctors to remove, the war seems forever lodged in his mind.

Even in the peaceful setting of a forested backyard, he discovers that his garden wedding contains the right ingredients to incubate vivid memories of those days in the jungle.

As this Vietnam Vet battles his pain with booze and drugs, he finds that he’s unable to hold a job or be a good husband.

While in the jungle, he dreamed of returning home alive and in one piece. But now that he’s home, what went wrong?

After Incoming is available through bookstores and online retailers. ISBN: 0-9708220-3-0, Trade Paperback, $19.95 retail price.

Visit www.highbridgepress.com to view Hodgkinson’s author page.

For more information, contact: Highbridge Press, P.O. Box 1228, Tupper Lake, NY 12986.

<<<   >>>

The Nine Lives of Cheo

By Cheo via Carol Main

Part IV

Then my person found a man who had an old dog, a blind hairless cat, and a young white cat, and we all came out here to live together.

The white cat was my first cat friend but she got real sick and couldn't eat anymore so I killed her so she would stop hurting.

Then the old dog died one night all by itself. Then we got three little kittens, and one of them was white so she got to be my new friend.

Then the old cat (who finally grew some hair on her body) died and the man went away to something called the cemetery, so now it was just me and my person again and these three little kittens in this New Mexico place that has honest rattle snakes that tell you when you are getting too close to their house instead of those sneaky copperheads.

I was happy, and I relaxed, so I had to die. If you are reading this, you are a person, so you do not eat spiders. When I was a baby the skunks showed me about spiders, about how good they all taste.

Spiders are like bumblebees. The biggest ones, with the fattest bodies, are the sweetest. Every place my person and I lived it was always my job to get rid of the spiders, snakes and mice because my person did not like them. Sometimes she would even pick me up and hold me to the ceiling so I could reach a spider.

One day I found this big black round bodied spider behind the toilet, so I swallowed it to bring back up later to chew on before I went to sleep. When I tried to bring it up later it would not come, so I forgot about it.

Then this puppy came here to live and got real big real fast. And my head started to hurt and I would get dizzy and if the puppy was in the house he would know it and come close so I could lean against him until I got okay and could walk away.

The doctor said I either had a brain tumor or had swallowed a female black widow spider and one way or the other I would die.

My person knew I hated the doctor because he always hurt me, so she did what needed to be done, and floated my body away down the Rio Grande. It is O.K., but I thought I would get to live longer. I'll be watching over. I am now with those who have gone before.

p.s.--to the person who found my CHEO cat's collar hung up on willow branches at the river bank and called me...thank you...now you know why I hung up on you. END.

<<<   >>>

Snow from Tuesday night’s blizzard settles along the Rio Grande and on Turtleback Peak with first light seeming to break the frozen face of the river Wednesday morning.
Photo by Bill Johnson

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