Tourists seek safety following floods that close Death Valley roads

ANALYSIS:

LOS-ANGELES (AP), Hundreds of Death Valley National Park hotel guests were trapped in flash floods. Crews made a path through the rocks and mud but road damage from flooding or debris was expected to continue into next week. Officials said Saturday.

The National Park Service stated that helicopters from the California Highway Patrol and Navy were conducting air searches of remote areas in search for abandoned vehicles but found no. However, it could take days to assess the damage – the park near near the California-Nevada state line has over 1,000 miles (1,609 kilometers) of roadway across 3.4 million acres (1.3 million hectares).

No injuries were reported after Friday’s record-breaking rainfalls. It was a pleasant 1. 46 inches (3. 71 centimeters) of rain at the Furnace Creek area. That’s about 75% of what the area typically gets in a year, and more than has ever been recorded for the entire month of August.

Since 1936, the only single day with more rain was April 15, 1988, when 1. 47 inches (3. 73 centimeters) fell, park officials said.

Nikki Jones is a worker at a restaurant who was stranded in the hotel because it had been raining when she went to breakfast on Friday. When she got back, the rapidly-accumulating water was at the doorway.

” Jones stated that he couldn’t believe what Jones was saying. I had never seen water rise so fast in my entire life .”

Fearing that water might enter their room on the ground floor, Jones and her friend put their bags on the beds. To keep the water out of their rooms, Jones used towels to cover the doorways. They pondered for two hours whether the water would flood their room.

” People around me said they’d never seen something this terrible before, and they’ve been here a while,” Jones stated.

While their bedroom was saved, at least five to six rooms in the hotel were damaged. Later, the carpet in those rooms was ripped.

The majority of the rainfall – just under an inch – came in an incredible downpour that occurred between 6 and 8 a.m. on Friday. John Adair is a meteorologist at the National Weather Service, Las Vegas.

Adair stated that flooding cut off Death Valley access, with roads being washed away and a lot more debris.

Officials said that

Highway 190, which is the main road through the park, will reopen Tuesday between Furnace Creek, Nevada and Pahrump.

Officials stated that

Park workers also left behind by closed roads continued to seek shelter, in lieu of emergency situations.

“Entire boulders and trees were being washed away,” John Sirlin said. He is a photographer at an Arizona-based adventure business who saw the flooding from his perch on top of a boulder high up.

” The noise coming from the rock falling down the mountain was simply incredible,” he stated in a telephone interview on Friday afternoon.

In the majority of areas, water has receded leaving behind a thick layer of gravel and mud. About 60 vehicles were partially buried in mud and debris. Numerous reports were made about road damage and multiple water mains were damaged in Cow Creek, the park’s residential area. About 20 palm trees fell into the road near one inn, and some staff residences also were damaged.

” “Due to the severe and widespread nature of this rain it will take some time to rebuild everything and reopen all,” Mike Reynolds, park superintendent said in a statement.

The storm came after major flooding at the park 120 km) northeast Las Vegas. After being inundated by mud from flash floods which also affected western Nevada, and northern Arizona, some roads were shut down Monday.

Friday’s rain began around 2:20 a.m. according to Sirlin who lives in Chandler and has been coming to the park every day since 2016.

“It was more extreme than anything I’ve seen there,” said Sirlin, the lead guide for Incredible Weather Adventures who started chasing storms in Minnesota and the high plains in the 1990s.

” Many washes ran several feet deep. He said that there were rocks covering about 3-4 feet of the road.

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