A rock the size of a brick smashed through the windshield of Cody Cervantes’ pickup Sunday afternoon as he was driving on Colorado 133 to pick up his wife in Redstone. Their 11-month-old son was strapped in his car seat next to him.
Investigators say if the windshield hadn’t been laminated, the rock’s trajectory would have been different and it likely would have landed in Cervantes’ lap. If it had hit a few inches farther to the right it would have been stopped by the window frame. But the rock that tumbled from a hillside – like so many do at this time of year in Colorado – broke through the right side of the windshield and hit Logan C.W. Cervantes directly in the forehead.
Within an hour he was declared dead. On Tuesday, his parents were at Farnum Holt Funeral Home in Glenwood Springs making arrangements to bury their only child.
“This is the biggest tragedy our community has had in a long, long time,” said Joyce Illian as she fought back tears while working at the Redstone General Store.
Illian said the Cervantes family is well-known around the tiny town of Redstone. Logan’s grandfather, Carlos Cervantes, has lived there and worked construction for as long as anyone can remember. Cody Cervantes, 21, and his wife, Darlene Malloy, 22, also are well known. Malloy is a volunteer with the Carbondale and Rural Fire Protection District.
It was other EMT volunteers with that department who tried to save her son after a passing motorist drove Cody and Logan to the Redstone fire station about 3 miles from the accident.
“There was nothing anyone could have done,” said Ron Ryan, director of investigations with the Pitkin County Sheriff’s Office.
That section of highway is often sprinkled with rockfall, like other roads through mountainous and canyon areas. The Colorado Department of Transportation spends $3 million a year on rockfall projects, said CDOT spokeswoman Stacey Stegman.
“All we are doing is minimizing the potential for a slide,” she said. “We cannot prevent them.”
CDOT concentrates on several areas a year, selecting locations with heavier travel and a higher risk of injury to motorists.
They include spots along Interstate 70, such as Georgetown Hill, DeBeque Canyon and Glenwood Canyon, Clear Creek Canyon along U.S. 6 and also Ute Pass in Colorado Springs.
Monday’s two rockfall incidents – one that killed Logan and another where a 100-pound rock landed on top of 64-year-old James Abramo’s Jeep in Clear Creek Canyon – do not indicate a bad rock-slide season.
“What we are seeing is a couple of loose rocks,” Stegman said. “They are not slides and could be a result of weather, animals or hikers, you never know.”
