Apparently a new hot spot is causing the road over it to melt. Its a fascinating place.



Hot Spot: Yellowstone Road Melts, Sites Closed
This undated photo provided by the National Park Service shows damage to a Yellowstone National Park road caused by the park�s ever-changing thermal features in the park in Wyoming. The hot, damaged pavement has prompted park officials to close Firehole Lake Drive and access to some geysers and thermal features at the height of summer tourist season. (AP Photo/Yellowstone National Park)


CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) � The ever-changing thermal geology of Yellowstone National Park has created a hot spot that melted an asphalt road and closed access to popular geysers and other attractions at the height of tourist season, officials said Thursday.

As they examined possible fixes, park officials warned visitors not to hike into the affected area, where the danger of stepping through solid-looking soil into boiling-hot water was high.

``There are plenty of other great places to see thermal features in the park,'' Yellowstone spokesman Al Nash said. ``I wouldn't risk personal injury to see these during this temporary closure.''

Naturally changing thermal features often damage Yellowstone's roads and boardwalks. Steaming potholes in asphalt roads and parking lots � marked off by traffic cones � are fairly common curiosities.

However, the damage to Firehole Lake Drive is unusually severe and could take several days to fix. The 3.3-mile loop six miles north of Old Faithful takes visitors past Great Fountain Geyser, White Dome Geyser and Firehole Lake.

Unusually warm weather for Yellowstone � with high temperatures in the mid-80s � has contributed to turning the road into a hot, sticky mess.

``We've got some ideas. We're going to try them. Our maintenance staff has really looked at the issue,'' Nash said.

Global warming!

No, wait, that's not right....

Climate change!


Damn, that's not right either.....



That's crazy stuff, stepping into boiling water would ruin a good vacation.

I am experiencing involuntary eyebrow activity.

Maybe this hotspot can solve all the derision among Repubs and Dems for the next couple hundred years by have a little 'splosion.

Been heating up for years....

Yellowstone Lake has domed to the point that water is rising at the south end of the lake! That....ain't good! Read one article that stated that if it ever 'blew'....the eastern edge of the crater would be at the western edge of Minnysoda!!

RMulhern,
I think either the article mistated or you misunderstood. The edge of the crater probably wouldn't be past Cody, if that far. The edge of the ash cloud would easily reach Minnesota. The theory is that the ash and gasses in the atmosphere would reflect so much sun light that it would cause a "nuclear" winter situation.

As the article states, the landscape in Yellowstone is always changing. The dome under yellowstone lake keeps rising and falling and the one under Norris Geyser basin is just as active. Hundreds of small tremors vibrate the area all the time and occasionally a jolt big enough to feel will hit. Thermal features stop and start with all of this geologic activity. There are many places in the park where pavement has opened up from below and steams constantly. Walking off of the boardwalks in the thermal areas is a BAD idea.

SRMarksman

Thanks! Probably I misread it!

reminds me a lot of of the situation back in 79 AD, when the folks living in Pomepii just went about their daily lives, as if nothing was going to happen with their neighbor, Mt. Vesuvius.

Volcanoes often don't get the respect they deserve. That's why so many died from St Helens.

They have a real situation there. Maybe a concrete road would hold up better in this environment?

I assume there's steam under there. I wonder how strong the crust is. It would be disconcerting to have a road over a steam bath collapse under your car.

Can you imagine what John Coulter thought when he saw what is now Yellowstone?

Nobody believed Colter during his lifetime. He was dead by the time other explorers saw it and spread the word. He was among the many members of the L&C expedition who went back west and died within just a few years of the trip.

Yep, it wasn't until the Hayden expedition when pictures and paintings by John Murie were brought back that people actually believed that a place like Yellowstone could exist. Very shortly afterwards the movement to preserve it came into being. President Grant signed the bill creating the first National Park in the whole world. That was in 1872. The Park Circus didn't come about until 1916. The Army ran the parks before then. They had to move the troops out in 1915 for world war 1.

"Colter's Hell"

And just to increase the concerns, it's bigger than previously thought:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/...e-supervolcano-eruption-magma-reservoir/

This happens in Houston every summer...

NBD

Snake

I said those very words the first time I saw that place.



Travis

If it blows, it will solve the border crisis and the national debt. Don't worry about it!

Just a shade to far from Mejico!

The comments to that article are pure comedy

global warming

I got some lobsters that ought to be cooked.

I believe he meant there won't be anything much left to cross the border and come to!

Yes they are!

Don't sweat it. If it gets ready to blow, O'bambam will just issue an executive order that it is not to happen on his watch. Should work as well as some of the other crap that happens when the congress won't pass his commie bills and then goes into recess.

Wayne

This ain't your daddy's volcano. And it ain't gonna blow when human's will record it.

From what Ive heard, its about 40K years late right now, give or take 100K years��


But it AINT your daddys volcano, this will make Mt St. Helens look like a pimple burst.


And I won't be posting No Mo�...

Saw that in our local rag.

At one time the volcano and high springs in Yellowstone were down around present day Salt Lake City. In about 3,000,000 years more or less the volcano and high springs will be up around Helena, Montana.

That's about all we can do. It's going to blow just nobody knows for certain when plus were would we go. When it blows most of the West will be gone and the people to. If it blows like the first be blow even the Est will be gone. Right now Yellowstone is the largest and most active super volcano in the world.

It sure will do that and it will solve our problem with DC to.

Same here!

Link please...call me a skeptic

Just in case I don't get the chance ...

Bye bye DD.

Bye bye Poobah.

wasn't Widespread Panic a popular rock band at one time?

OMG! Gaia choosing to thin the herd. what a concept.

I don't know where I'm a gonna go
When the volcano blow

But I don't want to land in New York City
Don't want to land in Mexico (no no no)
Don't want to land on no Three Mile Island
Don't want to see my skin aglow (no no no)

Don't want to land in Commanche Sky Park
Or in Nashville, Tennessee (no no no)
Don't want to land in no San Juan airport
Or the Yukon Territory (no no no)

Don't want to land no San Diego
Don't want to land in no Buzzards Bay (no no no)
Don't want to land on no Ayatollah
I got nothing more to say

Brother Jimmy Buffet

All we have to do is mention that if it blows, it will kill some wolves. The huggers will hold protest marches and sit in circles singing Kum Ba Yah and THEY'll get it stopped.

lol.

if Gaia is concerned about the wolves and humans, she'll manifest a pole shift, and move heaven and Earth's tectonic plates to avoid such a tragic loss of life.

on the other hand....

We can all follow the courageous style of Harry Truman when St Helen's blew. He laid in a supply of beer and rode it out along with his 16 cats. He's now under 150' of ash, of course, but he went out happy...we assume.

HARRY TRUMAN

true enough.

not everyone gets 72 years or more of air-breathing experice down here on the Earth.

for those who don't, their Eulogy could include the fact that God wanted/needed them sooner in Heaven.

so their life on Earth was cut short by plan.

Bye bye Fish Head.

His cats, however, are pizzed......