That's what they say, anyway.

"I've got a boat, just in case," joked Lloyd Hill, who lives near the Weber River just below the Wanship Dam.

Hill moved to this small Summit County town - also named Wanship - in 1995 for its beauty and tranquility. And he hasn't lost a wink worrying about the possibility of dam failure.

"But I've got a couple of sisters who won't even visit up here," he observed.

Four years ago, Jan Jones and her husband, like Hill, moved to the Wasatch Back after buying a place about a quarter mile downstream from the 52-year-old Wanship Dam.

"I don't think about it - ever," she said of the federal dam's safety. "If it's going to go, it will happen so fast that I won't have time to worry about it."

Most worry more about the water in the river than they do the earthfill dam, which underwent a series of routine earthquake tests as recently as summer 2007. With Rockport Reservoir now full, runoff is rushing over the Wanship Dam spillway and residents hope the Weber doesn't escape its banks.

Heber City-based contractor Dave Newhouse is finishing up a log house along the river. Its foundation is designed so that floodwaters can flow in and out with minimal damage to the structure.

"But if the dam fails," Newhouse said, "all you can do is grab your belongings and get."

Like Wanship, the Jordanelle Dam in neighboring Wasatch County meets federal safety standards. It is an earthen dam, built just 19 miles from Utah's seismic-prone Wasatch Fault. And it gave Ruth Holmes pause when she and her family moved in eight years ago and two miles directly downstream.

But she has been assured that in the event the federal dam fails from an earthquake or other cause, her family would have ample warning to evacuate.

"It wouldn't goosh out all at once," she explained. "It would start as a slow leak."

Beyond that, she has schooled her children to seek high ground in the event of such a warning.

"You have to have a plan because you just never know."

Buck Buchanan has a plan, too. He lives and works at the base of Jordanelle at the Heber Valley RV Park. He said it's a safe place because he will be the first to know if the 15-year-old dam springs a leak.

"I'll wave to you as I drive away."

csmart@sltrib.com