Mudslide In Theater! (Telluride CO)

[Jim Cassedy]

Every August for the past 18. years, I've worked projection at the Telluride FIlm Festival.
The venue I was assigned to most often is the "Palm Theater", a performing arts center
that is part of a school complex. In addition to digtial and 35mm film projection, it has a
full stage with a complete lighting system and scenery fly-loft, carpentry shop, etc.

Even though the average elevation of Telluride is almost 9,000ft ASL, it is located in
a canyon, and so the entire town is surrounded on 3 sides by mountains or very big
hills. On Friday (7/17) a torrential rainstorm caused a mudslide on the mountain or
hill behind the Palm theater. According to news reports, the wall of water and mud
smashed through one of the big doors, which I think was the one of the big loading
doors that goes right onto the stage, causing the mess you see here:

Videos I've seen show water gushing into the auditorium from somewhere backstage. Note the
handrail on the right, which would be where the steps are to walk down from the stage to the
auditorium level. (So, if you stepped off the front of the stage now, you'd be in chest-high water)
PalmFlood_3.jpg

The whole 1st row is completely submerged. Note the fly-ropes in the background. Fortunately, the
cinema screen, the speakers and the masking machinery are all attached to a motorized frame which
gets hoisted into the fly-loft when not being used. Luckily, they were safely hoisted well above the
prevailing water table when the water and mud breached the back doors.
PalmFlood_2.jpg

Even these seats, which are apx midway into the auditorium from the screen, are mostly
submerged. The lobby, all the backstage dressing rooms, and the scenery shop were also flooded.
PalmFlood_1.jpg
( Photo Credit: Telluride Daily News)

The Palm shares space with another, smaller venue in the same building. That venue is most likely under some
amount of water too, although I haven't seen photos. The Telluride Film Fest is a little over a month away. I'm
not sure what it's going to take to get this all cleaned up and dried out. They've already booked all my travel
and lodging arrangements, so I assume I'm stil going. Maybe this year they'll just hand me a mop to help clean
up. (and, honestly, if I wasn't working full-time ODYSSEY shows, I'd offer to travel out there at my own expense
and volunteer to help with the cleanup, as I'm sure many townspeople are doing. Telluride has been very good
to me, and I've met some great people there, so I wish I could give something back to the community. ) I'm not
sure where I'd stay until the festival starts, since lodging is pretty expensive, even for me. I suppose I could bring
an inflatable pool float and sleep in the theater. .

[Leo Enticknap]

Looking at those photos, I'm very sorry, but it's going to take the entire Army Corps of Engineers to have that theater back open within a month. The big time suck is drying it out, which insurers will insist on having been done completely, with all signs of damp gone, before any other remedial work will start.

In November 2000 I was working at this theater...

image.png

...when, as you can see, the river it is right next to flooded. Even though all three auditoria were on the second floor of the building (the lobby and a bar/restaurant were on the ground floor, and offices and electrical and plumbing infrastructure were in the basement, below the water line) and only suffered minor damp, the place had to close for five weeks. Even though the river was back down to a normal level within around a week, the power could not be turned back on until the basement had been thoroughly dried out with heavy duty plant and a whole slew of inspections done. The drying out took the best part of a month.

In your case the auditorium, and doubtless the basement below it, were inundated as well, and so the seats and carpeting will need to be replaced at a bare minimum, I'd have thought; not to mention most if not all of the infrastructure on the stage.

Hoping that they manage to find another theater for you this year, and can absorb (sorry!) the loss of this one by extending the schedule in others.

[Marcel Birgelen]

That's not just going to be the seats and carpeting, but most likely a big part of the sidewalls too and don't expect just a simple repaint... also, not only do you need to get the sludge out, like Leo indicated, you'll be drying out the place for weeks.

I guess they can be lucky it didn't happen with people in it...

[Ryan Gallagher]

Our most recent flood happened with people in it right before a film that had to cancel, but it was not a weather/mud flash flood, merely an extremely high volume street water main dumping through a porous basement wall in several places.

I feel for them, the amount of silt in their water is easily 10x what our first round brought in from below street level. We acted quickly both times, but it still required losing half the drywall to expose the framing on all interior walls, removing the entire stage deck and replacing it (to permit the drying of the sprung grid below). If there are any sub-levels below those pictured they are in a world of hurt on the remediation front.

We got lucky with chairs/upholstery due to immediate water removal and cleaning/drying within 24 hours, we also got lucky that the insurance claim was not denied due to "act of god" type situations. Claims like Telluride's, if denied, are the kinds of things that shutter theatre venues forever (who already run on a shoestring donations heavy budget). If there is not a huge community ground swell of support to offset insurance nightmares.

We managed to re-open once the auditorium and stage were ready within 2 weeks each time.

Since we are sharing pictures, this was round one water level after the big suck (heavier silting). But only made it above the seat cushions on row 1, never matched stage height.

IMG_5990.jpgIMG_5991.jpg

About a year later same water main broke about 6 feet away from prior repair, similar result, but not as much silt since the pathways had already been established. Photo taken mid "suck". 2nd time was also "luckier" because of audience present and full company staff. Hotel staff whom we share the basement with also jumped into action immediately this time and mitigated much of the office areas damage, but the low spot was still the auditorium, and it's path to get there was under the stage decking.

IMG_7829.jpg

[Marcel Birgelen]

It's sad to see such things, but I've had my fair share of experiences over the years.

For drywall, just clean water from a broken water mains is pretty deadly, even if you start drying it immediately, there is a large chance of mold developing, as the stuff is very good at retaining moisture for a long long time. So the best solution is to either completely gut it or at least cut it off well above the waterline and replace it.

I have different experiences with wood-based products. Stuff like MDF or plywood is often a total-loss, whereas stuff made from real wood will usually outlast those kind of events. It's especially all those "quick" building materials that seem to suffer the most in such circumstances.

[Barry Floyd]

Back in 2010, the Cumberland River flooded in Nashville and took out the 20 screen Regal / IMAX at Opry Mills. That theatre was closed for almost two years. Pretty sure it had to be completely gutted.

[Scotty Wright]

Back in 2010, the Cumberland River flooded in Nashville and took out the 20 screen Regal / IMAX at Opry Mills. That theatre was closed for almost two years. Pretty sure it had to be completely gutted.

Do you recall if that flood reached the imax booth? I vaguely recall a helicopter being used for something but can't recall or find if it was to bring in a new GT or the rooftop chiller

[Barry Floyd]

Do you recall if that flood reached the imax booth? I vaguely recall a helicopter being used for something but can't recall or find if it was to bring in a new GT or the rooftop chiller

I know the whole bottom floor of the mall and theatre were like 10 feet underwater. I do remember the helicopter, but don't know what it was used for. What I remember most about that time was the spike in OUR attendance after the flood took out that theatre.

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

Do you recall if that flood reached the imax booth? I vaguely recall a helicopter being used for something but can't recall or find if it was to bring in a new GT or the rooftop chiller

They recently replaced the rooftop chiller. The theater was closed for a long time because of that just a year and a half ago...

[Jim Cassedy]

I understand that a team of "Disaster Recovery/Restoration" experts has been brought in.
Some sort of estimate of what it's going to take to clean up the mess and how long it will
take to do so, should be forthcoming by the end of the week. The Palm Theater is
attached to a school complex, and I've been told that the 1st priority will be fixing up the
classrooms and other areas of the school that were damaged. (but. . . aren't those kids
out on summer vacation right now? )

[Frank Cox]

If the primary use of the property is the school and it's expected to take several months to get things dried out and reassembled, then the classrooms are probably the place to get started.

[Marcel Birgelen]

I understand that a team of "Disaster Recovery/Restoration" experts has been brought in.
Some sort of estimate of what it's going to take to clean up the mess and how long it will
take to do so, should be forthcoming by the end of the week. The Palm Theater is
attached to a school complex, and I've been told that the 1st priority will be fixing up the
classrooms and other areas of the school that were damaged. (but. . . aren't those kids
out on summer vacation right now? )

Like Frank already indicated: Don't expect this theater to be open any time soon... The restoration will take weeks if not months and it makes sense to start with the classrooms so they *might* be available after summer vacation ends.

I just hope they started to pump the sludge out as soon as possible and start throwing out everything that's soaked and dry up the place, because the humidity and mold will otherwise destroy everything that's left in the room and the rooms around it.

[Leo Enticknap]

The Palm Theater is attached to a school complex, and I've been told that the 1st priority will be fixing up the classrooms and other areas of the school that were damaged. (but. . . aren't those kids out on summer vacation right now? )

They might be right now, but the clock is ticking. My son's school year starts in mid August, and I'd guess that it'll be around then in Telluride, too. If the teaching space got whacked as badly as the theater, the school district has a huge challenge on its hands.

[Scotty Wright]

Incredible recovery

[Jim Cassedy]

Incredible recovery

I have been too busy with ODYSSEY, and dealing with a major TMS RAID failure
(which caused me to loose craploads of content and a plethora of playlists) to keep up
with any news about this, but it IS amazing that it looks like the theater and the school
will pretty much be 'back in business" by the end of the month. Given the amount of
water in the original photos I posted, and in other pix I saw a few days later, I can
only speculate that they must have had teams working almost 24/7 and spent a
mountain of money to restore some sort of normalcy. The Telluride Film Fest folks
finalized the last of my travel and lodging arrangements on Friday, and I'm really
curious to see the amazing restoration job they've managed to accomplish when
I get there later this month.