There were around 3,000 people in Austin that day, and the catastrophic failure of the dam resulted in the deaths of 78 of them, and approximately $10 million in property damage. The madam of the town's brothel, which was located upstream of the town, saw the failure coming and warned the town, saving many lives. A young girl named Mary Fran Simmons, a new immigrant from Galicia, warned many of the townspeople about the impending disaster with her extremely limited English, simply pointing and repeating, "Dam! Dam!"