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The forces of fire and ice have shaped Yellowstone National Park for thousands of years. It took humans decades longer to tame it long enough for tourists to visit, often from the comfort of their cars.
In a few days, heavy rains and rapid snow melting occurred a spectacular flood which can forever alters the human footprint on the grounds of the park and the communities that have grown up around it.
The historic flood that hit Yellowstone this week caused bridges to collapse and destroyed homes, diverted a famous fishing river, possibly permanently, and could force the reconstruction of streets nearly swept away by torrents of water. in new places.
Paths almost uprooted by torrents of water. Photo: AP
“Landscape, literally and figuratively, has changed dramatically in the past 36 hours, ”said Bill Berg, a commissioner in nearby Park County. “It’s a bit ironic that this spectacular landscape was created by violent geological and hydrological events, and it’s not very helpful for that to happen when we’re all here.”
The unprecedented flood drove over 10,000 visitors from the national park oldest in the country and damaged hundreds of homes in neighboring communities, although surprisingly no injuries or deaths have been reported.
The only visitors left in the huge park that spans three states were a dozen campers who were still walking away from the camp.
Locked down
The park may be closed for up to a week and the north entrances may do not reopen this summerSuperintendent Cam Sholly said.
“I heard this it is a 1000 year event, whatever that means these days. It seems to be happening more and more frequently, “he said.
Aerial photo of Yellowstone Park hit by historic rains. Photo: AP
Sholly pointed out that some weather forecasts predict the possibility of further floods this weekend.
The days of rain and rapid thaw devastated parts of southern Montana and northern Wyoming, where shacks razed, flooded small towns and cut electricity. The flood hit the park as the summer tourist season, which attracts millions of visitors, was picking up on its 150th anniversary.
The hard-hit Gardiner companies had just begun to really recover from the tourism recession caused by the coronavirus pandemic and they were looking forward to a good year, Berg said.
The rains swept away the huts and flooded the small towns. Photo: AP
“It’s a city of Yellowstone, and lives and dies for tourism, and that will be a blow, “he said.” They’re trying to figure out how to stay afloat. “
Some of the worst damage has occurred in the northern part of the park and in the gateway communities of Yellowstone in southern Montana. They showed photos from the North Yellowstone National Park Service a mudslideleached bridges and roads undermined by the floods of the Gardner and Lamar rivers.
In Red Lodge, a town of 2,100 that is a popular starting point for a scenic drive to the Highlands of Yellowstone, a creek that flows through the city has bypassed its banks and flooded the main thoroughfare, leaving the trout one day. swimming in the street. Sun. treasure.
The flooding of the Yellowstone River wiped out trees and houses. Photo: AP
Residents described a heartbreaking scene in which water ran from a rivulet to a stream in few hours.
the water fell telephone poles, knocked down fences and opened deep crevices in the ground through a neighborhood of hundreds of houses. Electricity was restored on Tuesday, but there was still no running water in the affected neighborhood.
Heidi Hoffman left early Monday to buy a bilge pump in Billings, but when she returned, her basement was full of water.
“We lost all of our things in the basement,” Hoffman said as the pump sucked in a steady stream of water into a muddy yard. “Yearbooks, photos, clothes, furniture. We clean for a long time “.
Neighbors try to retrieve personal items after the flood. Photo: AP
Rains, heat waves and fires
The flood came as the Midwest and East Coast crackled a heat wave and other parts of the west burned for a start of the fire season in a persistent drought that has increased the frequency and intensity of fires. Smoke from a wildfire in the Flagstaff, Arizona mountains could be seen in Colorado.
Although the flood was not directly attributed to climate change, Rick Thoman, a climate specialist at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, said that a warmer environment makes extreme weather events more likely than they would have been “without warming caused by human activity.”
Will Yellowstone repeat itself in five or even 50 years? Maybe not, but at some point there will be something equivalent either even more extreme“, She said.
A destroyed road to Red Lodge. Photo: AP
Heavy rains on snowmelt in the mountains pushed the Yellowstone, Stillwater and Clarks Fork rivers to record levels monday and caused rock and mud slides, according to the National Meteorological Service. The Yellowstone River in Corwin Springs broke a record set in 1918.
Roads north of Yellowstone can be impassable for a considerable period of time. The flooding affected the rest of the park as well, with officials warning of even greater floods and possible problems with the water supply and sewage systems in developed areas.
The rains came just as hotels in the area filled with summer tourists in recent weeks. More than 4 million visitors were counted from the park last year. The tourist surge doesn’t subside until the fall and June is usually one of the busiest months in Yellowstone.
A neighbor pumps the water from his home in Red Lodge. Photo: AP
In a cabin in Gardiner, Parker Manning of Terre Haute, Indiana, had a close-up view of the turbulent waters of the Yellowstone River right outside his door. To his surprise, entire trees and even a lone kayaker “sailed” past.
In the early afternoon, he recorded a video while the waters they devoured the opposite shorewhere a large brown house stood precariously that had been the home of park employees before they were evacuated.
In a great crackle that was heard above the roar of the river, the house overlooked the water and was carried away by the current. Sholly said he floated 5 miles (8 kilometers) before sinking.
A house falls into the Yellowstone River. Photo: Reuters
The towns of Cooke City and Silvergate, just east of the park, were also cut off by the floods, making drinking water dangerous as well. People have left a hospital and the low-lying areas of Livingston.
In south-central Montana, 68 people in a camp were rescued on a raft after the flooding of the Stillwater River. Some streets in the area were closed and residents evacuated.
At least in the village of Nye four cabins were swept away to the Stillwater River, Shelley Blazina said, including one she owned.
“It was my sanctuary,” he said Tuesday. “Yesterday I was in shock. Today I am alone in intense sadness “.
By Matthew Brown and Lindsay Whitehurst, Associated Press
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Source: Clarin
