How the "Water Witch" kept Las Vegas hydrated

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Jun 3, 2015

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How the "Water Witch" kept Las Vegas hydrated

Sin City has lived under the threat of running out of water for years, but one woman has saved the city in the desert from drying up.

Aerial view of the Las Vegas boulevard, the Strip, in Las Vegas, Nevada on June 10, 2011. The Las Vegas Strip is an approximately 4.2-mile (6.8 km) stretch of Las Vegas Boulevard in Clark County, Nevada, adjacent to, but outside the city limits of Las Vegas proper. Many of the largest hotel, casino and resort properties in the world are located on the Las Vegas Strip. Nineteen of the world's 25 largest hotels by room count are on the Strip, with a total of over 67,000 rooms. AFP PHOTO / GABRIEL BOUYS (Photo credit should read GABRIEL BOUYS/AFP/Getty Images)

Sin City has lived under the threat of running out of water for years, but one woman has saved the city in the desert from drying up.

For nearly 30 of the 100 years it's been around, Sin City has lived under the threat of running out of water, but that hasn't stopped the city's growth, only the housing crisis did that. And the oasis in the desert has continued largely because of one woman who's been able to find water in the most unlikely of places.

Tweets by AbrahmL

is a Senior Reporter at Pro Publica and he's part of a team that's put together a series of stories about the water crisis here in the West, including one with the "Water Witch."