As they watched, billows of roaring, fiery waves engulfed the Los Angeles Basin. One closeup shot brought tears to many eyes as walls of water engulfed the tall buildings in West Los Angeles like a deadly, malevolent force, smashing them to pieces in mere seconds, then roaring on by as fast as the eye could follow, to claim more and more victims.

THE FIRST INDICATION Manuel Quintana and his family had of the approaching horror was a steadily increasing roar in the distance. At precisely 7:00 P.M. they heard what sounded like a loud ripping sound as the meteor plunged through the atmosphere. They huddled silently, shivering in fear at the rush of the wind that preceded the three hundred billion pounds of fiery rock hurtling through space toward the surface of the ocean.

By 7:01, Pacific Coast time, the entire sky overhead was lit up like the light from a hundred suns. The roof on the transmitter building burst into flames, and then the gas tanks in both their automobiles exploded. Manuel could hear the three boys gasping and crying softly in their trenches, but he was relieved that they were staying down in the water.

At 7:02, they heard distant thunder that sounded like the roar of ten thousand jet engines. The sky screamed overhead, and the wind whipped over the top of their mountain like a hurricane. To Manuel, it felt as if some great vacuum had been created in the heavens that was sucking up everything in the atmosphere. From one second to the next Manuel did not know if he wanted to live or die. Surely nothing alive could possibly survive what was taking place at that hour.

Every member of the Quintana family was fully submerged under two feet of water like creatures in suspended animation. The life-saving fluid around them was growing hotter by the second. But at the moment of impact, they were still alive.

In the distance there was a tremendous explosion, and the earth shook like nothing they had ever felt before. Seconds after the meteor struck the water, they heard a deafening roar and an explosion thousands of times louder than anything they had ever heard in their lives. Outside the water, Manuel thought, surely our ears would have been shattered. Surely we would have been roasted alive! The scalding wave of heat shot over their mountain at that instant. But the Quintanas stayed low in the water, praying silently, shaking, and waiting. Waiting to see what would come next.