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Hear from the folks that live, breathe and know the national parks best.
Everyone. Welcome in to another edition of the Safe Travels podcast. My name is Joey. Today, we're joined by Matt LaMar who is a park ranger here at Death Valley National Park. And in this conversation, we discuss geology and climate.
Speaker 1:All right. So Death Valley, it is pretty incredible to drive through. It's pretty incredible to hike in. And I think initially when you think of this vast desert landscape, you don't think too much in terms of geology. In Death Valley, there's slot canyons, there's sand dunes, there's craters, there's so much.
Speaker 1:Can you talk a little bit about, you know, the the vast desert here and everything that is entailed in in Death Valley? Absolutely.
Speaker 2:I mean, I think that's a common misconception. When people think of deserts or North American deserts, they have a very, like, monotone view of it. There's maybe sand. There's maybe cactus. But when you come to Death Valley, you have that opportunity to experience the variety.
Speaker 2:So we're the size of Connecticut, so we're the size of US state, so that geographical size alone is gonna mean there's a lot of variety. We also have this incredible change in elevation here in the park. We have areas below sea level, and then we have mountains that go up to 11,000 feet. So when you have that type of change in elevation over just 20 miles, you're gonna get vast changes in, the climate of those areas even, the flora, the you know, the plants and animals. And then on the valley floor, yeah, you can go from these big expansive salt flats and drive 25 minutes, and suddenly you're at sand dunes.
Speaker 2:Then drive another 30 minutes, and you're at these volcanic craters. When you walk through the canyons of Death Valley, you're walking through time. You're seeing all these layers that have been laid down 1000000 of years ago, and you can see these geologic processes that happened a long time ago, but because we don't have all this pesky vegetation everywhere, it's laid out for for you to see and explore and take the time to to learn about. And so it's one of the things that I think doesn't just make that valley special, but it's one of the things that keeps drawing people back to death valley. And this is such a great park to visit time and time again because there's always something new to explore.
Speaker 1:So you mentioned the the canyons here, and you think about Grand Canyon and that's, you know, the the biggest example of erosion and showing away the 1,000,000,000 of years of layers being stacked on top of each other. But in
Speaker 2:a way, you can see similar things here at Death Valley. Right? You definitely can. It's a little bit more complicated here, because Grand Canyon, you have water eroding away those layers. They're kind of nice, and they're nice and stacked.
Speaker 2:Here, you do have erosion, put you for through water, but you also have a lot of tectonic activity. So you have these faults throughout the park that is causing, you know, an uplift of the mountains, and it can be quite complex. We have an area in the southern end of the park called the Amargosa chaos, and many a graduate student has gone down there to try and figure out what exactly happens in this area. So it's not always as easy to distinguish the Lares, but what's what makes it such a great playground, for geologists, to come here, to look at these layers, to try and understand what activities, what geologic processes cause them to occur. It's really quite magical, to dive into, and every mountain range has its own story to tell.
Speaker 1:You mentioned the geologists and archaeologists. What's the process that it takes to go into these canyons and be able to measure out how these canyons formed and date back the time period in which, you know, the erosion may have occurred or the sediment layers had occurred.
Speaker 2:You know, Death Valley and and really all national parks, they're places of science. So we are these kind of living laboratories where people can come and they can learn about that geologic history. And so every year we have universities that come out and different agencies that come out to to study the landscape and the geology, and they build upon all that information that people have been learning for the last, see, a 100 plus years coming to the park, and continue to fill in those gaps. Because even though this is a place of research, there is so much more research that can be done, that will be done over time. And it's one of the really cool things as a ranger here is you get to interact with these experts coming into the field and learn more about this place that, you know, I call home.
Speaker 1:And when you look up at the mountains, it almost they're like painted, like perfectly painted in pastel colors and there's chunks of different colors here and there. Why is that? What what's the different colors the pastel paintings on these mountains?
Speaker 2:Yeah and that really comes back to the variety of Death Valley. This is a place of nuance. I think sometimes when people first come into the park, there's this idea that everything's like it's all kind of different shades of brown. But then when you really start looking you see exactly that. You see there are greens and there's there's blues and there's reds.
Speaker 2:There's so much nuance here in Death Valley and they all come from these different processes. One of the most famous examples is, a place called Artist Palette where you go there and you see these really beautiful hillsides. And all of that is from volcanic ash long ago, that interacted with water and then oxidized into these various colors. And it creates this beautiful artist palette that has become one of the most popular areas in the park. And so each layer, again, just has its own composition, its own story, and, you know, you can spend a lot of time here just looking at the mountains and seeing that differentiation between the different layers.
Speaker 1:You just mentioned in, a new layer that we haven't talked about yet, but there's erosion, there's tectonic activity here, there's also volcanic activity that's occurred in the park and one of those examples is Yubihibi Crater. Can you talk about how Yubihibi Crater became what it is today and the volcanic, you know, activity within the park?
Speaker 2:Yeah. I mean, the volcanic activity, the story of Death Valley goes back a long time. A lot of that volcanic activity happened before the valley we know today even formed, which is only about 3000000 years ago. But we do have some more recent volcanic activity. The best example is Yubihibi Crater which is in the very northern end of the park.
Speaker 2:It's called a Mars volcano. And so it's where lava underneath the surface came in contact with groundwater, causing a buildup of steam. Eventually, that pressure was so great, it caused an explosion to form. And so now you have a 600 foot volcanic crater, in Northern Death Valley, that's a half mile across. And the thought is that that activity happened just within the last couple 1000 years.
Speaker 2:So there was almost certainly a human presence in the valley, when those activities were happening. It wasn't 1,000,000 of years ago, just
Speaker 1:And when that explosion occurred, the explosion ranged, covered a range of 6 miles, right, in terms of the debris that was scattered in
Speaker 2:the park? You can. And so there were multiple explosions, so there are multiple small craters around there, but the largest crater, Ubihebe, you can see the impacts when you go up there today. You can see where that landscape is covered in this kind of volcanic, rock and ash that's around that area. It's got like a little bit of a blackened landscape there.
Speaker 2:So you can see that impact even today, 1000 of years later.
Speaker 1:Are there any areas in the park that maybe archaeologists or geologists are looking at that may be an active site where they're studying if something is, you know, coming within the next 1000 years or even sooner?
Speaker 2:You know, it's really hard to predict those type of things. I would say the disaster that's most likely to happen besides flooding, which we we do get quite a bit, is gonna be probably something on the tectonic level, with an earthquake. Like most of the West Coast, Death Valley is overdue for our next big earthquake. The last major one was about 2000 years ago and, they say it should happen about every 2000 years. And so a lot of, scientists that do come here are studying that activity, do expect that sometime in the not so distant future, we probably will experience a pretty significant earthquake in the area.
Speaker 2:Mount Volcano, I haven't heard as much about.
Speaker 1:You talk about tectonic activity in the park. Do you feel anything throughout the year in terms of maybe microactivity that's occurring?
Speaker 2:Not a whole ton. It's certainly happening within the region. Most of it not perceivable, by the average person. There was a earthquake not that long ago on centered around Ridgecrest, California that was felt here in the park, but we haven't we don't get quite the same seismic activity you would get, in other parts of Southern California.
Speaker 1:And speaking of tectonic activity, one of the most famous parts of this park is Badwater Basin and you know, we talk a lot about erosion and how geology, you know, that's kind of one of the terms we go to in which speaking about geology, but that's not the case with Badwater Basin.
Speaker 2:A lot of it came through tectonic activity. Correct? It did. So this part of California, stretching all through Nevada and into Utah is probably what we call the basin range. And so it formed when there was this big stretching of the earth's crust and it broke apart the earth into the earth the crust into these blocks.
Speaker 2:And so as it stretches, those blocks tilt, and you get this rise of the mountains, and you get a fall of the valley floor. And so Badwater is one of those examples where you have mountain, and then you've got a basin, and then you've got another mountain. And all that's tectonic, and it is an active process where you're still getting movement along these fault lines. This is a relatively new thing that's happening. And this, again, goes all the way through Nevada into Utah.
Speaker 2:It just so happens that here at Death Valley, we have that lowest point, lowest place in all of North America, that water basin, 282 feet below sea level. And yet 20 miles away, there's a mountain that's 11,000 feet tall. That's a pretty crazy change, in such a small distance.
Speaker 1:And a 100 miles away is the tallest mountain in the lower forty eight with Mount Whitney right behind Telescope Peak.
Speaker 2:That's true. Yeah. So Mount Whitney, and Spatwater, really in the same county, though Whitney does straddle that line within Yoke County, which is kinda mind blowing for folks from, say, like, the East Coast. Like Yeah. You just don't see that rapid change that you get in a place like California.
Speaker 2:And the Sierra is not part of the Basin and Range, a different process to get them to form. But to stand on the top of some of the peaks here in Death Valley, particularly a peak like telescope, and to be able to look at the lowest place in North America and then look the other direction and see the tallest mountain in the lower forty eight, it's one of the best views in the country.
Speaker 1:And then speaking of best views, you also have Dante's peak right around there too where you can see the whole park and obviously a kind of a historic peak in terms of movies that have been filmed there and pop culture which is which is pretty unique, but yeah, you mentioned it's the lowest place in North America and I think that's what originally made me think of erosion, of eroding the layers away and getting closer to the Earth's crust but as you just mentioned, the tectonic activity. So how is how is Badwater Basin so salty? Obviously, being a salt flat, what caused the reason for, all the salt that's kinda on the bed of of that layer?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So it's a low point because of that tectonic activity. It's a salt flat because of the water. So whenever we do flood, you know, whenever we get rain in the mountains or in the valley, that water will eventually flow down to the lowest points. It will flow down to that basin, which is bat water.
Speaker 2:And so as water comes down the mountains, it moves through the canyons. It's picking up all the rocks. It's picking up all the debris. But when that water exits the canyon, it's like taking your thumb off a hose. It loses that pressure, and so it starts dropping things.
Speaker 2:First, the bigger rocks, then the smaller rocks, and then eventually, it's only carrying the smallest particles down to the valley floor. And those smallest things are the evaporative materials. They're table salt. They're gypsum. They're borax.
Speaker 2:And when that water eventually evaporates, that's what's left behind. And so you've got these big ranging evaporative plains, on the valley floor.
Speaker 1:You mentioned borax. Big part of the geology in this park is, the gold rush and the mineral rush within California, and obviously borax and the 20 Mule Team, that was located in Death Valley. What about Death Valley made this such a almost like a mineral hub for people to come here and all all the mining that's occurred within the park?
Speaker 2:Yeah. A big part of our story is the mining story. The vast majority of mines, though, within this region aren't successful. Beth Valley is a hard place to mine, particularly in the late 1800, early 1900. There's not a ton of water.
Speaker 2:There's not much infrastructure, so it's hard to get things out. There's not much fuel. And so the majority of mines didn't work out. There's about 3 minerals that did produce some level of, profits for people, gold, borax, and talc. And of those 3, borax was by far the most profitable mineral in Death Valley.
Speaker 2:And this was a major hub in the 18 eighties and then again, in the early 19 100. But around the late 19 twenties, even that kind of left Death Valley because a new mine, actually, south of here called Boron in Boron, California was found. It's maybe the richest borax mine on Earth.
Speaker 1:Wow. And there's 18,000 mines that exist within Death Valley. Of that 18,000, which what amount of them were successful and profitable then? I don't have an exact percentage for you, because there was different levels of profitability. On a large commercial scale, when we're talking about, like, gold mines, you know, there
Speaker 2:were, like, 3 really successful ones that stand a bit above the rest. And that was the Skidoo mine, the Keen Wonder mine, and then the Montgomery Shoshone mine, which is actually just outside the park, in a place near Rhyolite, Nevada. And those all produced over a $1,000,000 worth of gold, within the park, all within the late 18, early 19th, 19 100.
Speaker 1:But, again, a lot of these on a commercial level
Speaker 2:didn't really succeed. But there were some prospectors that came out there. They found one mine. They would work it for 10, 20 years, and they were enough to sustain themselves. And a great example of that is the Eureka Mine in Pete Augerberry, over in the western end of the park, who worked here for a long time, making enough for himself.
Speaker 1:And you talk about Keene Wander Mine. If visitors go there, it just reopened a couple of years ago, after renovations. If visitors go there, what can they expect to find and learn?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So Keene, which is one of the most successful, gold mines in the park, it's a really, really beautiful area. It's one of my favorite areas to go out and explore. There's a little spring there. There's a couple cabins.
Speaker 2:But the thing that really makes Keene stand out is the aerial tramway. Over the course of just, like, about a mile and a half, it rises over a 1000 feet of elevation from the valley floor up to the mine site itself, and it's still in really good condition, partially through the stabilization efforts of the National Park Service and our partners. And it just it's it's hard to believe that it was built back in the day. Really no air conditioning out there. They were working it for large parts of the year just to make a living out there, and it's it's really remarkable and worth exploring.
Speaker 1:And that's what I was gonna ask is, how did they make it work back when these mines were created and I've experienced the heat these last couple days and, I'm sure obviously with the technology nowadays and the renovation abilities that we have, you know, in front of us, how did these these conditions how are they feasible for the miners that were in the park?
Speaker 2:It varied greatly. You know, during the summer, it was hard to work in Death Valley. And so some mines, like the Harmony Borax mine, they ceased operations for about 3 months out of the year, 3 or 4 months out of the year. They moved to higher elevations. So they would move up to about 3,000 feet where it was 10 to 15 degrees cooler.
Speaker 2:So instead of a 125, it was just a 110. Still high. I still went and worked in those conditions, but they did have to make some concessions to the climate of the area. And during the summer, you just weren't gonna have as many people in this region, or you're gonna move up to higher elevations where temperatures are somewhat cooler.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. I noticed that going from the Mesquite sand dunes up to Ubehebe Crater. Even that elevation change was about 10 degrees in the middle of the day, which is pretty incredible to to to feel and I know some of the campgrounds are at higher elevation here and so if you are looking for a little bit of relief, during the summers, the higher elevation campgrounds I'm sure are a little bit cooler than what you might find here near Badwater Basin or or Furnace Creek. Oh, definitely.
Speaker 2:It's May 15th right now. I think it's gonna be a 108 degrees on the valley floor, but when you look at the Panamint Mountains, telescopes still have snow on it. So, you know, when you have these incredible changes in elevation, there is relief out there. You just gotta go searching for it.
Speaker 1:Yeah. That's incredible. I I'm glad you brought that up because at the campground here in Furnace Creek, you do look up and you see snow capped mountains while you're down here sweating and kinda baking. It's pretty incredible, to view that and see that. Absolutely.
Speaker 1:And that's why, you know, Death Valley, I think, during the summer can scare people away because people are seeing a 120 degrees.
Speaker 2:And in the lower elevations, you don't wanna spend a lot of time outside, but you can go up and you can hike a telescope peak. You can see Mount Whitney from up there. You can look down at Badwater Basin, and you can still have a fantastic experience. And that's why this park really is a year round park even though, we are known for our extremes.
Speaker 1:Yeah. But we're gonna talk about climate in a minute, but a few more things on the the geology front. The sand dunes, Mesquite sand dunes and then there's a number of other sand dunes within the park. How does that process occur? How is there just a part of the park where a collection of sand exists?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I think, again, talking about at the very beginning, what people expect with deserts, I think a lot of people expect sand dunes everywhere. When you come to Death Valley, it's not the case. Like, the vast majority of our park doesn't have sand dunes because they need the perfect conditions to exist. So they need, 1, a source of sand, of course. And so at the Mesquite sand dunes, most of that comes from the Conwynd Mountains.
Speaker 2:That is where rocks have been broken down and weathered over time into a sandy material. It then needs to be carried by wind to a location, and that needs something to stop that wind from keeping that wind or keeping that sand from moving. So something to drop it. And so at the Mesquite sand dunes, it's right at the base of Tokai Mountain. And so it acts almost as an eddy, causing that sand to drop and then dunes to form over time.
Speaker 2:Wow. And so we have about 7 different sand dune systems here in the park. Mesquite sand dunes are definitely the most popular, but we have other sand dunes like the Eureka sand dunes, which are the tallest dunes in California. 650 feet tall, or the tallest sand unit in Mesquite is a 130 feet tall. Wow.
Speaker 2:So you have this really variety even within sand dunes themselves. They all need generally those same conditions. A source of sand, something to carry it, and something to drop it.
Speaker 1:Have you noticed an uptick in tourism to these, sand dune areas since the Dune movies come out? We definitely had some mentions of it, but, you know, we're perhaps most famous though for, the original Star Wars trilogy. Yeah. Parts of
Speaker 2:it being filmed here in Death Valley at the Dunes, and that that definitely has drawn people to the park. You know, when when you go around Death Valley, it does seem like you're on other planets sometimes. Yeah. You you feel otherworldly. And, Hollywood certainly agrees, with Star Wars, but even NASA agrees, because talking back to, like, the science of this park, a lot of planetary science is actually done here in Death Valley.
Speaker 2:Yeah. We've been a stand in for Mars. Some of the rovers currently on the Martian surface, like the Curiosity and the Perseverance, elements of those missions were tested here in Death Valley first before landing on the red planet. So it's pretty cool that, yeah, when you're on Death Valley, you can about as close as most of us will ever come to walking on another planet.
Speaker 1:That's incredible. What parts of the park have been used for the Mars rover and other NASA equipment?
Speaker 2:Quite a few areas. The most famous is an area called Mars Hill, which is right at the exit to artist's pallet.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:One of my favorite things that's been tested here, though, is the Europa Clipper, which I don't know if you've heard of the moon of Europa. It is an icy moon around Jupiter Okay. With vast liquid oceans underneath its surface, more water on Europa than we have here on Earth. Now when you think of Death Valley, you don't think of ice, and you don't think of oceans. But what this moon has are these big evaporative salt pans, just like we have down at Badwater and at Devil's Golf Course.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And so they've tested a lot of their mission elements here in Death Valley, particularly around Devil's Golf Course. Because when they have to land that rover on Europa, they're not gonna be able to do it themselves. It's all gonna be automated. And so they need to find something similar enough that they can safely land that mission on this moon.
Speaker 1:And that's here in Death Valley. Who knew? Yeah. That's incredible. You mentioned Devil's golf course, really close to Badwater Basin.
Speaker 1:What's the difference between those two areas? The big difference is elevation. It's very slight, but Badwater, is
Speaker 2:a couple feet lower than Devil's Golf Course, and that means Devil's Golf Course does not flood as much. Those raised areas, tend to be above the watermark so they don't get reset. And so over time, that salt has kind of started to erode away into these big mounds. Where at Badwater, it kind of is more uniform throughout.
Speaker 1:We talk about all these great geological, spots within the park. There are dangers, to visitors that come and there's certain steps that visitors have to take in order to protect the park. One of those is off roading and as appetizing as it may look sometimes, look at the sand dunes and and go off roading or some of these great spots in the mountains. What are the harms, that visitors are doing to the park when they do that with their vehicles? Absolutely.
Speaker 2:You know, national parks, the National Park Service that I work for, our our job as an organization is to preserve these landscapes. Not just for the people today, but for people 50 years down the road, a 100 years down the road. And so we treat these areas as outdoor museums. To protect them, you know, you need to respect them. And so when you drive out on the sand dunes or or more specifically, when you drive out on, like, a salt playa or at the racetrack, which is a remote area of the park that's really famous for these moving rocks, your tire tracks can last there for decades.
Speaker 2:Your impact, your 30 seconds or your 5 minutes, your joyride will have impacts that visitors will see for years down the road. And so it's just recognizing that these areas are shared experiences. They're shared with each other, that scenic beauty. They're also shared with the plants and animals that call this home. And when you're driving over vegetation or driving over a sense of tortoise habitat, you're impacting the species that live there.
Speaker 2:And so leave no trace really is is the name of the game. It's trying to minimize that impact. And the number one rule of Leave No Trace is plan ahead, be prepared. And so we ask when people come to this part to to understand what those rules are, understand what those regulations are, where you can go off road, where you can't go off road. And here in the park, you do have to stick to roadways.
Speaker 1:We talked a little bit off camera about Joshua Tree, being a great climbing park and not too far away from Death Valley. Why is Death Valley not a great climbing park? It's really
Speaker 2:the rock materials. A lot of the rocks here are pretty loose. It's a lot of sedimentary rocks, and so you're just not gonna get the same type of rocks that you get in Joshua Tree, which is world class climbing. Or even near Vegas, like Red Rock Conservation Area, world class climbing within the region. But here, just the makeup of our rocks, it can be really dangerous.
Speaker 2:Every year, we have folks that climb up to places, and then they find they can't get back down. Mhmm. It can be really challenging, particularly around some of our most famous hiking areas, like Golden Canyon, Zabriskie Point, where we have to send out people to rescue folks who get themselves into bad situations. So it's all about being smart, going to the right areas, and understanding, what landscape you're walking through.
Speaker 1:What other, threats does the park pose to visitors from a geological standpoint in terms of instability or going off trail that could harm a visitor? Is there any other spots within the park that you've noticed, you know, visitors finding them in bad situations?
Speaker 2:You know, definitely off roading, is one of the big examples that we talked about, but it's also this idea that, taking resources from the park. It's people going to, again, the racetrack where you have these rocks that have seemingly moved across the playa. You've got a rock and you've got a trail, and then people sometimes taking those rocks home with them. Once that rock disappears, like, it oozes all context. It oozes meanings for those visitors and this is a pretty rare process.
Speaker 2:So it's not like it's going to just another rock's gonna appear, all of a sudden. And so it's keeping things there, leaving things there for others to enjoy.
Speaker 1:Now, let's transition into climate. Obviously, geology is a big part of Death Valley National Park but climate is also a very significant part of Death Valley and I've experienced that these last couple of days with the heat that's here. There's a great variation between winter time and summer time visitation. Summer visitation is about 1 5th of what it is during the winter times. What is the heat really like in Death Valley and what does it do to the visitors when it comes here?
Speaker 2:Yes. Death Valley, we are a land of extremes. So, we've got the lowest place in North America but but we're also the driest place in North America, and we're maybe the hottest place in the entire world during the summer months. Temperatures can regularly get over a 120 degrees Fahrenheit, over 50 degrees Celsius. And when you're talking about that level of temperatures, it can be quite dangerous for folks.
Speaker 2:But we still do get a number of visitors that do come here to the park even during the summer. That's when their vacation ends. Or maybe they want to see what these extremes feel like. And you can do it. You just gotta be plan ahead.
Speaker 2:You gotta be prepared. And you just gotta do it responsibly, because it can be a very diff dangerous situation.
Speaker 1:One of the really cool things I think about Death Valley is the rain shadow that's caused by the Sierra Nevadas and other mountain ranges that really block the moisture from coming to Death Valley. Can you explain that process and the ranges that are really actively, not allowing Death Valley to to receive the rainfall and the moisture that those parks in those areas are receiving?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Most of our moisture, you know, would come from from the coastal areas. And so between us and the coast, there are 4 major mountain ranges. And so each time that moisture comes in from the coast and it goes over mountain ranges, it's like a sponge. It just squeezes out some of that moisture.
Speaker 2:And so we go over the coastal range and they get about 45 inches of rain year. Then it hits the Sierra Nevada and they get another 25 inches per year. Then after that, it's the Inyo and the White Mountains, which is another 15 inches per year. And then after that, it's the Panamette Mountains, which is another 12 inches of rain. So by the time that sponge gets to Death Valley, there's just not much moisture left.
Speaker 2:And so that is why on average, we get less than 2 inches around 2 inches of rain per year, which does make us the driest place in North America. And it's one of the reasons our landscape is the way it is It's because you have to be a very hardy plant or animal to survive in this area. And so we don't have a lot of vegetation, so that geology is exposed in part because of that extreme climate of extreme, dryness, also extreme heat. When we
Speaker 1:think of death valley, we think of the heat, we think of the dryness. Is that trend of it being really hot and being really dry continuing to rise with climate change? What in what ways is climate change affecting the park further?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Death Valley is also it was recognized pretty early on that this was a extreme environment, and so we actually have a long history of weather data within the park. There's been a weather station here in Death Valley since 1911. So over a 100 years worth of data. And like pretty much weather from around the globe is telling us, with the weather stations, we are getting hotter.
Speaker 2:6 of the 10 hottest years have come in the last 10 years. And so a place that's already at the extremes of temperatures. What happens when we push that extreme even further? When we see these average temperatures that are just getting hotter and hotter. When the lows are continuing to stay hot and we're not cooling off even during the coolest parts of the day, we'll still sometimes be over a 100 degrees Fahrenheit.
Speaker 2:How does that push these plants and animals and are they able to overcome that? And what we're seeing is that, quite a few of these plants and animals are having real impacts. And a good example of that is up on Telescope Peak with our Bristlecone Pines. These are the oldest living organisms, in the world. They can live 1,000 of years, these trees.
Speaker 2:And yet over the last 10 years, we've lost a significant number of our those grusclan pines on the southern slopes of the peak. Trees that are over a 1000 years old that should have 1,000 of more years left are suddenly dying. And a lot of that is because of the extreme drought that we were been experiencing in California and those increases in temperature.
Speaker 1:What about fires? Are is vegetation in, in the park being affected by fire? Is fire not as significant of a a player in Death Valley National Park?
Speaker 2:Fire is incredibly significant to California. For Death Valley, a little bit less so, but we do have a lot of vegetation up in the mountains. And so it is a concern. We do actually have a fire ban here in the park during the summer months when things are really dry and brittle. Thankfully, over the last couple of years, we have not had any significant wildflower fires, but we have been impacted by other wildfires in the region.
Speaker 2:Sequoia National Park had a fire not that long ago, and all that smoke ended up in in the valley. And that certainly impacted both the people living here, but also the visitors coming to the park who, when they went to the top of Dante's view, couldn't really make out the valley floor because of all the smog and smoke. So I would say it's not as big a concern as some other parks, but it is not it's it's certainly still in the back
Speaker 1:of our minds. The process in which heats up the valley is really fascinating to me. Can you talk about why that valley is so hot, in terms of heat getting trapped by the mountain ranges that surround the valley floor?
Speaker 2:Yeah. It's kind of going back to what we talked about with geology, where we have this lowest place in North America, 280 feet below sea level, and it's in a really deep valley with mountains going up to 11,000 feet. So during the summer, that sun is is baking all the rocks. It's baking the valley floor. And the valley's so deep that that air can't escape.
Speaker 2:So it rises, but before it can escape, it starts going down and then it reheats. And so it acts almost like a convection oven where we get this constant reheating, this constant cycle, that pushes us to these these extreme temperatures because it can't get up and over the mountain. It can't get out of the valley floor.
Speaker 1:And that's why it stays so hot so late in the in the night too. Right? It sure does.
Speaker 2:You know, if you're here during the hottest part of the year, can still be well over a 110 degrees at midnight. And so people that are like, oh, why wanna hike at night? It's still not an option. It's still too hot. You wanna camp here during that time of year, you're gonna have a pretty miserable experience.
Speaker 2:And so it does really impact what you can do in Death Valley, particularly on the valley floor.
Speaker 1:I had that experience last night. Pretty tough.
Speaker 2:Yes. Yeah. And here we are in May, so it only gets worse from here. And I will say, actually, this time of year is when we see people often putting themselves in the worst situations because it's hot. It's hot compared to really anywhere else in in the United States right now, but it's not as high as it does get.
Speaker 2:And so people think it's okay, to camp or to go on these long hikes. And they get pretty far out there, and then they realize they've made a mistake. And we just hope that they don't put themselves in situations where we have to go out there and try and rescue them.
Speaker 1:In the winter months, what changes, and what is the temperature like? What can visitors expect to to see when they come here during the winter months or the most popular months of the park? Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Here in Death Valley, a lot of our heat comes from from the sun itself. So as we move to those shorter days, we don't get as hot. So the winter from about really mid October, really mid November through mid April, it's a great time to come to Death Valley, particularly in the lower elevations. The temperatures are quite pleasant. Days are generally fairly warm.
Speaker 2:Nights can even get cold. We can get into the thirties at night during those coldest months of December and January. But it's a great time to hike to to Canyonere, to explore a lot of the areas, within that valley floor.
Speaker 1:What are some of the early signs if somebody is hiking during the summer that maybe they should turn around and and give up on the trail that they're they're going after or whatever activity they're going after. What are the some of the early signs that, you know, visitors can take into account when when making that decision to go back to to coolness?
Speaker 2:Yeah. The human body is pretty good at telling us when when things aren't going well. So you're gonna get that sense of thirst, where you can't quench necessarily. It's not uncommon to get dizzy, to have nausea, to feel faint. And, hopefully, you're paying attention to those signs before it gets to that level.
Speaker 2:It gets really extreme. If you really start to stop sweating, then your your body is is not cooling down anymore. And so you can put yourself in a in a in a pre bad situation. And what we also have found is that people will go out, they'll exert themselves, they'll know that they are they're tired, they know they're a little dehydrated, and then a couple hours later, though, that's when they'll get the nausea. They'll get more symptoms down the road.
Speaker 2:So it's all about being preventive, drinking plenty of water, at least a gallon of water per day when you're here during the summer months, even when you're not active. Minimizing that time outside and try and maximizing your time in air conditioning whether it's your car or stopping by the visitor center, Because, yeah, it can it can sneak up on you sometimes.
Speaker 1:Well, finally, what's one final takeaway you want visitors to have whether it be on the geology standpoint or the climate standpoint?
Speaker 2:Yeah. I think that Death Valley is a really special place. You know, it is a national park for a reason. It's a national park in part because of those extremes, in part because of the landscape that those extremes have created. And I hope the visitors will take the opportunity to come out here and experience it for yourself.
Speaker 2:But because it is a remote area, because it is an extreme area, it's really important to just have a game plan. You know, call the rangers in advance. You know, let us give you some tips and hints. Check out our social media page. Check out our website.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of great information about how to explore Death Valley safely and what there is to do, in this this great park.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Matt, thank you. Yeah. Thank you. I hope you enjoyed this edition of the Safe Travels podcast.
Speaker 1:Matt is awesome and so knowledgeable about Death Valley, and the geology here at the park really is amazing. I highly suggest coming to this park and enjoying the variety of different geological features from sand dunes to mountains to bad water basin. And the climate here is extreme. So if you do come during the summer months, make sure to prepare appropriately, and enjoy the park safely. So if you like this type of content, make sure to like, comment, subscribe wherever you're listening or watching from.
Speaker 1:And until next time, safe travels.