Several people swept away, rescued from wash near Hard Rock Hotel

Three people were rescued after being swept away in a wash Sunday afternoon near the Hard Rock Hotel.

At about 12:15 p.m., the Clark County Fire Department received reports of the incident on Paradise Road near East Harmon Avenue, Assistant Fire Chief Larry Haydu said. The department removed a manhole cover downstream and rescued all three people, who were not injured.

Haydu said the city’s homeless often use the washes for shelter and sometimes fail to get out before flooding. In this instance, he said, seven homeless people lived in the wash, but only four escaped in time.

The seven people had lived in an encampment in the center channel of a three-channel bridge, Haydu said. They had created a makeshift dam that eventually broke, causing the incident.

This is the second water rescue in the past three days, he said.

Contact Rachel Hershkovitz at rhershkovitz@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0381. Follow @rzhershkovitz on Twitter.