[Geysers] Yellowstone June 22 (Stephens)

[Lynn Stephens]

THIS POST IS FOR THE PERSONAL READING OF THE SUBSCRIBERS TO THIS LISTSERV AND IS NOT TO BE

REPRODUCED IN WHOLE, OR PART, FOR ANY OTHER PURPOSE, INCLUDING PUBLICATION IN THE SPUT OR 

ANY OTHER OUTLET.

 

Many summers I go the entire summer without using the NPS radio for anything other than calling in Great Fountain predictions.  Every once in a blue moon I call in a vehicle accident or a disabled vehicle.  Yesterday I thought I used up my season's quota of "special" radio calls with two vehicle accidents.  But this morning I was, once again, on the radio to 700 (Com Center) requesting assistance.

 

After my early morning visit to the Visitor Center to delog, I was on my way out to try to catch the early morning eruption of Pink Cone.  As I passed by Lemon Spring, I noticed an individual walking toward me.  Since I hadn't passed any cars on Firehole Lake Drive, this struck me as strange, but then I thought maybe he had parked near Firehole Spring and was just walking back to look at Lemon Spring.  As I got nearer, I recognized the individual as Vladimir, who has been coming here since 1997, watching both geysers and wildlife.  

 

I pulled over, rolled down the window and he said, "You're going to see something at Great Fountain that you've probably never seen before.  I've done something just awful.  Can you call Triple A for me?"  With visions of his vehicle having collided with the signpost, or backed off the road into the trees east of Great Fountain, I replied that I couldn't call AAA, I could only call Com Center because they are the only ones who can call a tow truck.  (For those of you who don't know, here in Yellowstone, YPSS has the exclusive contract to do all commercial towing.  In Mount Rainier, back in the 80's when my father worked there, there was no equivalent of YPSS inside the park.  All the commercial towing companies in the surrounding gateway communities knew that, although they were allowed to come into the park, they could only do so upon specific request through NPS law enforcement.)  I pointed to the pile of junk in the passenger side of my pickup, indicating that I didn't have room to give him a ride so I would meet him at Great Fountain.

 

When I arrived I was greeted by the sight of his vehicle off the road.  The wheels on the driver's side were in the runoff channel and the wheels on the passenger side were dug into the road embankment such that the vehicle was sitting at about a 50-55 degree angle.  Knowing that law enforcement personnel were not on duty yet, I called 700.  When 700 responded, I explained I was at the Great Fountain parking lot on Firehole Lake Drive with a vehicle off the road in Great Fountain's runoff channel, no injuries involved.  The radio operator confirmed my location, then called Tim Townsend at home to get him out of bed to come assess the situation.  Awhile later I heard Tim ask 700 if a wrecker had been called, which it had.

 

When Vladimer got back to Great Fountain he told me what had happened.   Vladimir explained that he had gone out to Great Fountain for the eruption that was predicted between 9:30 pm and 1:30 am.  He had apparently parked so he could shine his headlights on the eruption and had turned a switch so that his headlights did not turn on automatically because "My car is too clever for me."  I didn't quite get when Great Fountain erupted.  But Vladimer said that he didn't have a place to stay last night because when he got back from the northeastern section of the park, where he had been the past two days, camping at Pebble and Slough Creek campgrounds, Madison campground was full so he didn't have a place to stay.  He was going to stay at Great Fountain.  But the law enforcement ranger(s) came through at 1:10 (not 1, but about 1:10) and told him he had to leave.  They moved on before he did.

 

When Vladimer started his car to follow them, he forgot that his headlights wouldn't come on.  The faint tire tracks show that the car made a straight line right across the bumper log and into the runoff channel.  The line was angled toward White Dome so the car dned up parallel to the road rather than going across Great Fountain's runoff and up onto the large terrace.  He told Tim that when this happened the law enforcement rangers hadn't reached White Dome but he was unable to get their attention so he ended up spending the night at Great Fountain even though he knew he was supposed to leave, but it was impossible for him to leave.

 

When Tim arrived he asked for my prediction on Great Fountain and I said the roll-forward prediction would be 9:30 am - 1:30 pm.  But at 6:20 Great Fountain had a false overflow so I told Tim we probably had about 2 hours before the next eruption.  Since the estimated time of arrival (ETA) on the tow truck was about 35 mintes, we figured there would be sufficient time to clear the scene.

 

The tow truck arrived, the driver commented on the fact that he'd seen me yesterday, and then proceeded to extricate Vladimer's vehicle.  It was a slow process because he didn't want to damage either the vehicle or the thermal feature.  He had the car out by about 7:45 am, said "I think it's drivable, but let me take it for a test drive."  When he returned about 10 minutes later he said the car was good to go as soon as Vladimer settled up with him.  

 

Tim finished his discussion with Vladimer with instructions to go to Madison immediately to get reservations for the rest of his stay.  Vladimer did so, returning to Great Fountain just as it erupted at 0834, pause = 0, of = 88).

 

After the car had been removed, we were able to see there was a 6-8 inch deep gouge from the tires on the passenger side in the fill used to create the embankment.  Those we brushed away using our feet and any vestiges will probably disappear with the next pounding rain storm.  (We had some white raindrops during Great Fountain's eruption, but only light stuff today.)  I told Tim I thought that Great Fountain's eruption would remove the driver's side tire tracks on top of the sinter.  (There was about a 2" "rut" where the soft, previously broken sinter pieces had been displaced and piled up on either side of the tire rim.)  Even though Great Fountain's eruption was not huge, it was strong, including the fourth series, and it had a fifth burst, but no sixth.  As I suspected it would, the first burst obliterated the tire tracks on the sinter, washing the the runoff channel into its normal smooth appearance.  Vladimer was very relieved because he was really worried about the "bad" thing he had done to the geyser.

 

In the early stages of dealing with the incident, Scott came through on his way in and told me his story of the grizzly and the elk.  Scott went on over to Pink Cone to get the start and called the time (0620, I=21h28m).  I haven't gone back to check the missing days with overnight, late evening, and late afternoon eruptions, but the intervals seem to be fairly consistent recently at the 21-1/2 hour average.

 

I almost lost it with a visitor this morning, but kept my mouth shut.  A white pickup had been parked in the handicap parking area during part of Great Fountain's eruption, but I didn't say anything to them.  Then they drove to White Dome, but decided to come back to Great Fountain and didn't want to go around.  As I saw the headlights coming back toward the Great Fountain parking lot, I stopped the traffic trying to go toward White Dome to get the wrong-way pickup turned around.  They pulled into a parking space and sat there during the next two bursts of Great Fountain.  After the weak fifth burst, I walked over the prediction board to change the sign.  One of the parties (not the driver who had not responded positively to my brief safety education) walked over and said "So when is it going to erupt?"  I almost said, "It did while you were parked in the handicap parking and then it continued to erupt while you were sitting there."  Instead, I explained it had just finished its eruption.  She said, "You mean that was an eruption?"  I replied, "You must have just seen the last part of the eruption," and walked away before I said anything else.

 

While Tim was at Great Fountain making certain the wash from the eruption had erased the tire tracks, a wrong way driver in a black vehicle approached from White Dome.  Tim had him turn around right there.  Near the end of Great Fountain's eruption, Kitt encountered a wrong way driver as she was coming in.  That driver just ignored her and continued going the wrong way.  Tim was in uniform so the person didn't even get to go back to the Great Fountain parking lot to turn around; I had a park service radio and volunteer hat so that person reluctantly turned around; Kitt just had right on her side so that person ignored her.  (At Mount Rainier when law enforcement caught wrong way drivers coming up a road, they made them back down and wouldn't let them turn around.)  

 

I watched several bluebirds, on on top of a red stop sign.  While I was at Flood I saw an osprey fly by twice.  The first time I thought it had a very strange looking fish in its talons.  The second time I realized it was carrying a clump of grass, presumably to line its nest.

 

While I was waiting at Till, I watched two bull bison trying to determine which of them was going to dominate the other.  The loser took his frustration out on a little lodgepole pine, savaging the tree until the bison had several branches caught in its horns and hanging over its eyes.  

 

MaryBeth just called waves on Grand and the afternoon Grand at 1817.  I was recently asked what Grand's burst average was.  I replied, "About 1.5."   The person seemed surprised at my response and said, "You understand that means it is having more one burst than two-burst eruptions because it's had a few three-burst eruptions."  I replied "Yes, I know, I haven't run numbers, but I still think it's about 1.5."  So, I ran the numbers for May 29 (the first day in the new logbook) through June 15 (I keep forgetting to include this in the daily report.)

 

One burst =   17

Two burst =    7

Three burst =  4 

 

Average = 1.54

 

Lynn Stephens

 

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