Yosemite closes cabins, camp sites.

The National Park Service declares that nature wins. After a study revealed that 3,000-foot-high Glacier Point is unstable, park officials are closing eighteen cabins and a half-dozen walk-in campsites at Curry Village in Yosemite National Park. 

MiguelVieira on flickr.com

"There are no absolutely safe areas in Yosemite Valley," said Greg Stock, the park's first staff geologist and the primary author of a new study that assesses the potential risk to people from falling rocks in the steep-sided valley. Curry Village is the highest risk area and was hit by a major rock fall several years ago.

The Service has declared a formal "hazard zone" that also encompasses El Capitan, considered a rock climber's paradise. Rock falls are common in this area, but since visitors only travel through the area, not camping in it, the Service isn't as concerned as they are about Curry Village.

Rock falls at the camp area have dumped what is described as 570 dump truck loads worth of stone over the last four years. One camping cabin was flattened, 16 others have been hit in the indiscriminate boulder war put on by nature. Two deaths and numerous injuries have been recorded in or near Curry Village in the last 16 years.

Camping will continue in other Yosemite campground venues.

Source: rvtravel.com and KQED News.