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Last summer, a large wildfire that came to be known as the Oak Fire scorched its way across California's Mariposa County and threatened Yosemite National Park. First reported on July 22, 2022, the Oak Fire burned more than 19,000 acres of land, cost more than $90 million, and evacuations forced the displacement of thousands of Californians and visitors in the fire's path as it rapidly expanded. "Experts say dry air, strong winds, parched trees and grass and soaring temperatures caused the Oak fire to expand rapidly through the rugged foothills in recent days. The area has experienced nearly two weeks...

71-year-old Edward Hackerman was arrested last week and accused of starting last year’s Oak Fire. Hackerman was taken into custody last Friday for starting the fired that charred over 19,000 acres. Hackerman is reportedly a retired firefighter with 12 years experience. The fire destroyed 127 homes and over 60 other buildings. snip Edward Wackerman is a Democrat donor who gave money to The Lincoln Project and other leftist campaigns.

Yosemite National Park remains closed indefinitely as startling photos show popular parts of Yosemite Valley buried in snow. Heated tents in Curry Village and a shuttle stop near Yosemite Falls, both highly trafficked locations even during the cold season, were blanketed in snow. The park originally closed to visitors last weekend as severe winter weather approached the Sierra Nevada. The storm ultimately dumped "up to 15 feet" of snow in some areas of Yosemite, the park noted on Twitter, and created whiteout conditions across the region over several days. For its part, Yosemite Valley tallied 40 inches of snow Tuesday...

Visitors to Yosemite National Park got more than they expected when a rockslide came off the east side of El Capitan on Monday, originating very close to the park’s famous firefall. The tail end of the incident —– which happened at about 11:45 a.m. — was captured on video by photographer James Piper. In the video, the sound of crashing rocks can be heard echoing across the valley as smoke, debris and dust fill the air at the base of the iconic El Capitan. "Holy God," a man in the background can be heard saying. Link to video: https://twitter.com/i/status/1627900010909306882

Yosemite National Park is once again requiring face masks in certain areas of the park. With Mariposa County at the high community level and Tuolumne at the medium community level, the park put out this statement: “Due to the high COVID-19 community level, mask-wearing is now required for all people when entering federal buildings and public transportation in Yosemite National Park, regardless of vaccination status.” TCPH COVID-19 clinics graphic TCPH COVID-19 clinics graphic Masks were also reinstated indoors in June last year when the infection numbers were high as well. Regarding vaccines, Tuolumne County Public Health is holding several COVID-19...

Two people were killed on Tuesday in a rockslide at the Highway 140 entrance of Yosemite National Park. The victims have been identified by Park officials as 51-year-old Georgios Theocharous and 35-year-old Ming Yan, a married couple from San Jose. The incident occurred around 9 am when the couple were driving on El Portal Road, near Big Oak Flat Road. Approximately 185 tons of rock fell 1,000 feet onto the roadway below, pushing the couple’s Dodge Ram onto the embankment of the Merced River. Following a brief closure, Highway 140 once again opened to the public, only to close again...

A fast-moving brush fire near Yosemite National Park exploded in size Saturday into one of California's largest wildfires of the year, prompting evacuation orders for thousands of people and shutting off power to more than 2,000 homes and businesses. The Oak Fire started Friday afternoon southwest of the park near the town of Midpines in Mariposa County and by Saturday morning had rapidly grown to 10.2 square miles, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, or Cal Fire. 'Fire activity is extreme,' Cal Fire said in a situation report on Saturday, noting that the wildfire is at...

Environmentalists are trying to block the U.S. National Park Service from removing dead and excess trees from Yosemite National Park for fire prevention, saying the effort harms conservation and violates existing federal environmental law.

A Navy helicopter crew looking for a hiker missing in some California mountains east of Yosemite National Park survived after they crashed near the tallest peak in Nevada, and both the searchers and the hiker were rescued over the weekend. The four-member crew escaped injury but had to spend Friday night in the rugged wilderness before being rescued Saturday from a ridge along the California-Nevada line, about 120 miles (193 kilometers) south of Naval Air Station Fallon, Nevada, authorities said. The Navy is investigating the cause of the crash reported about 5 p.m. Friday, Navy spokesman Zip Upham said Monday....

Earlier this month, they and a group of friends spent nearly a week stringing a single, 2,800-foot (853-meter)-long line from Taft Point west across a series of gulleys that plunge 1,600 feet (488 meters). Moises and Daniel Monterrubio, brothers who are training to be rope-access technicians, had been thinking about crossing that void for a year. Highlining is high-altitude slacklining, in which a narrow strip of strong, nylon webbing — usually an inch wide and a few millimeters thick — is strung between two anchor points and serves as a kind of balance beam. Completing a line means carefully heel-toeing...

The left-wing media in the US are railing against the questions about Joe Biden’s mental capacity and have instead found a bizarre way to prove he’s up to the job says Sky News host Chris Kenny. “I keep telling you, it might be depressing, but this US presidential contest is never going to be boring,” Mr Kenny said. He said CNN has launched a bizarre attempt to prove the presumptive Democratic nominee is up to the job, namely "because he can ride a bike". ...

President Trump pulled an inside straight to win in 2016, and now he needs another one. The good news for Trump is that his approval rating has stopped falling recently. The bad news is that it has stabilized in the low 40s. Election-watcher Harry Enten points out that no president since Harry Truman has won with anything like Trump’s negative net approval rating. Truman won at –6, while incumbents who lost (Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and George H. W. Bush) averaged out at about –13, roughly where Trump’s number is. The presidents who won reelection averaged an approval rating of...

Since the start of the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic, Democrats have wanted the National Park Service to shut down parks or slowly open facilities across the nation. Despite his party's push to limit how Americans spend their time, particularly outdoors, Congressman TJ Cox (D-CA) pulled strings to get into Yosemite National Park on the 4th of July. Cox, whose district falls close to Yosemite, had his staff request two parking passes for a personal visit to the park. At the time, people could request one of 340 tickets available. Tickets were given on a lottery basis. Because Cox was wanting to...

No one is more important to the history of environmental conservation than John Muir — the “wilderness prophet,” “patron saint of the American wilderness” and “father of the national parks” who founded the nation’s oldest conservation organization, the Sierra Club. But on Wednesday, citing the current racial reckoning, the group announced it will end its blind reverence to a figure who was also racist. As Confederate statues fall across the country, Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune said in an early morning post on the group’s website, “it’s time to take down some of our own monuments, starting with some...

The number of black bears has QUADRUPLED at Yosemite since the park closed due to coronavirus as the beasts migrate there while visitors stay away 'The National Park Service (NPS) is working with the federal, state, and local authorities to closely monitor the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) situation.' Ranger Katie, a biologist who's worked with black bears for over a decade, said in a Facebook live stream video that the animals are now having a 'party' since humans have been barred from visiting. There can be literally walls of cars, stop-and-go traffic or people in the park,' she said. 'So, for...

Being cooped up at home is no fun for humans, but bears are making the most of the extra space at California's shuttered Yosemite National Park. "The bears are just literally walking down the road to get to where they need to go," Ranger Katie Patrick said during a Facebook Live event on Sunday. She is a wildlife biologist who has worked with black bears in Yosemite since 2007. "For the most part, I think they're having a party," she said in response to questions about what the animals have been doing since Yosemite closed on March 20. Normally this...

Danielle Burnett, of Lake Havasu City, Arizona, was scaling the steepest part of the trail Thursday when she fell more than 500 feet (150 meters) down the steep, rocky terrain. Gediman says Burnett was dead when Park Rangers arrived on the scene. Rangers installed cables to help hikers get to the top of the 8,800-foot rock face. The cables are installed each summer to assist the climbs of thousands of hikers who make the popular 14-mile round trip.

Yosemite National Park’s great Ahwahnee Hotel has its name back. The Ahwahnee was renamed the Majestic Yosemite Hotel after the park’s former concessionaire filed a lawsuit against the National Park Service in September 2015, claiming ownership of some of the park’s trade names and trademarks. The Ahwahnee Hotel was named The Majestic Yosemite Hotel. The Wawona Hotel became Big Trees Lodge. Curry Village became Half Dome Village. And Badger Pass Ski Area was renamed Yosemite Ski & Snowboard Area. As part of a $12 million settlement paid to the park’s former concessionaire, names that had been changed during the lawsuit...

Against a backdrop of jumbled boulders and spindly trees, former Joshua Tree National Park Supt. Curt Sauer joined dozens of people at a rally in this high desert enclave on Saturday to express their anger over the economic and physical damage caused by the partial government shutdown to the park and the surrounding community. President Trump signed a short-term spending bill on Friday that will reopen the government until Feb. 15. But the 35-day shutdown has already taken a heavy toll on the economy of this dusty refuge for nature lovers, rock climbers and artists at the main gateway to...

The couple – who were both born in India and living in the U.S. – died of “multiple injuries to the head, neck, chest and abdomen, sustained by a fall from a mountain,” Dr. Sung-Ook Baik, a forensic pathologist in the Stanislaus County Coroner’s Office, wrote in a Jan. 4 report, reports said. Viswanath’s brother, Jishnu Viswanath, told the Associated Press the couple were setting up a tripod-mounted camera near the ledge of Taft Point on Oct. 23. An inquiry into how the couple fell is ongoing. “Any deaths that happen inside the park, the National Park Service rangers do...