Archive for April, 2009
Posted by Muir on
April 30, 2009
A 47 year-old Ohio man was rescued after falling 60 feet while hiking in the Grand Canyon yesterday. The accident occurred on the Grandview Trail just east of the Grand Canyon’s South Rim Village. The man and his friends were several hundred feet down the trail when he stopped to look over the edge and lost his balance.
Because of the steep terrain and difficult switchbacks, rangers called for the park helicopter and rescued the man using a short-haul operation. A rescuer hangs from a fixed line below a helicopter, which flies a short distance to the rescue site. The rescuer grabs and secures the patient, then the helicopter flies the pair to a safe location. The man was later flown to the Flagstaff Medical Center to be treated for life-threatening injuries.
Park rangers want to remind visitors to use caution when hiking in or along the canyon. Be sure to watch your footing and your surroundings. To learn more about hiking the Grand Canyon and safety tips, visit the park’s website or call the Backcountry Information Center at 298-638-7875.
Story at NPS
Posted by Muir on
April 29, 2009
Firefighters are working to contain three wildfires in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
The popular Laurel Falls Trail near Gatlinburg was closed Tuesday by a 100-acre wildfire, which was started by an illegal campfire. Officials are using an air tanker to dump water and fire retardant on the wildfire.
On the North Carolina side of the park, firefighters are working with the Bureau of Indian Affairs to contain a wildfire that began on the Qualla Boundary Reservation near Cherokee. Only a small part of that 1,500-acre fire was inside the park.
Several local fire departments have also responded to fire in the Cobbly Knob community that burned up to the Foothills Parkway east of Gatlinburg.
Story at WLOS
Posted by Muir on
April 20, 2009
The National Park Service has chosen Alaskan photographer Carl Johnson as artist-in-residency. Johnson will spend a month taking photos of landscapes at Badlands National Park in South Dakota.
Johnson will also test some new photographic ideas and gear. He will use a solar panel for power at a remote location for time-lapse photography. “I am going to be trying some long-term exposures in remote areas, using a Brunton solar panel and Powerbase battery to power my camera,” said Johnson. “The goal will be to set up for one scene, then take a photo a minute for a 24-hour period, and combine the images in Quick Time Pro to make a stop action HD movie of that day.”
Story at Alaska Journal
Posted by Muir on
April 9, 2009
On March 28, 2009, there was a large rockfall from Ahwiyah Point near Half Dome in Yosemite National Park. The rocks fell about 1,800 feet, knocking down hundreds of trees and burying hundreds of feet of trail on the southern portion of the Mirror Lake Loop Trail, which is now closed to hikers indefinitely.
The impact generated a magnitude 2.4 earthquake. Numerous smaller rockfalls have occurred from Ahwiyah Point since the initial rockfall. There were no injuries or damage to buildings. The approximate volume of the initial rockfall was 43,000 cubic meters weighing 115,000 tons, representing the largest rockfall in Yosemite since the 1987 Middle Brother event.
Rockfalls are a natural and dynamic geologic process. Due to its steep, glacier-carved cliffs, Yosemite Valley experiences many rockfalls each year.
Story at NPS
Posted by Muir on
April 8, 2009
The National Park Service has released an overview of the terrific Public Lands Bill that the U.S. Congress and President Obama recently approved. Here is the official NPS press release with details:
WASHINGTON–A waterfall that helped power the Industrial Revolution, a battle that became a turning point of the War of 1812 and a presidential birthplace in a place called “Hope” will soon be added to the National Park System. The new parks are just part of a wealth of public lands protections made law this week in the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009. “We are in a time of deep uncertainty and economic pain, but for Americans, moments of crisis are opportunities to rebuild, renew and restore the places we cherish,” said Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar. “With a stroke of his pen, President Barack Obama has ensured that treasured landscapes and places of historical and cultural importance will be protected and honored as part of our National Park System.”
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Muir on
April 6, 2009
In response to a new disease that has killed over 400,000 bats in the Northeast U.S., officials at Great Smoky Mountains National Park have closed all of its caves to public entry until further notice.
According to biologists from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, a condition called White-nose Syndrome (WNS) is taking a heavy toll on bats that hibernate in caves and mines in nine states from Virginia north to New Hampshire. WNS is named for a white fungus that appears on the noses of bats.
The disease causes bats to emerge from hibernation early and underweight so that they starve before the insects on which they feed emerge in the spring. Once a bat colony is infected with the fungus, the disease spreads rapidly and can kill up to 90% of the bats within that cave in one season.
Story at NPS.gov
Posted by Muir on
April 3, 2009
Officials at Acadia National Park have closed hiking trails on and around the Precipice Cliff to protect peregrine falcons that have been showing pre-nesting behavior. The closure of the popular Precipice Trail on the side of Champlain Mountain is expected to last until late July or early August. That’s about five weeks after the newborn peregrine chicks are expected to take their first flights. If the birds’ nesting attempt fails, the trail could open sooner.
Acadia National Park was selected in the 1980s to be one of the reintroduction sites for a peregrine falcon recovery program. Since 1991, more than 80 chicks have fledged on Mount Desert Island. The bird is listed as a Maine endangered species.
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Posted by Muir on
April 2, 2009
The Share the Experience Photo Contest is an annual photography competition encouraging amateur shutterbugs to explore our nation’s federal lands and share the experience with all Americans by submitting their favorite lands photos.
The contest is sponsored by Olympus Imaging America Inc. and the National Park Foundation in partnership with the National Park Service, the Bureau of Land Management, the Bureau of Reclamation, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the U.S. Forest Service. The Share the Experience Photo Contest showcases the more than 500 million acres of Federal Lands and draws entries from all across the United States.
“We’ve been hosting this contest for nearly a decade and it has become an important way that we connect Americans to their parks and federal lands,” said Vin Cipolla, Vice Chairman of the National Park Foundation. “We’re proud to be working with Olympus and all the federal agencies to inspire Americans to discover our nation’s most treasured places.”
Share the Experience Photo Contest
Posted by Muir on
April 1, 2009
No one was injured in a giant rockfall near the mile-high Half Dome in Yosemite National Park, but it did close a trail.
The falling boulders unleashed so much energy before daybreak Saturday that it registered as a magnitude-2.5 earthquake. The debris fell into Tenaya Canyon and buried the southern portion of the Mirror Lake loop trail.
The avalanche from Ahwiyah Point was the largest in 10 years, surpassing the October rockfall that forced the park to permanently close part of Curry Village. The park’s geologist said the rockfall was reminiscent of one in 1996 that created an air blast that flattened thousands of trees and killed one tourist.
Story at SFGate
