Climbing and Outdoor News from Here and Abroad - 6/23/22

Northwest:

--News Channel 21 is reporting that, "A climber from New York apparently triggered a small avalanche that sent him tumbling down the north side of South Sister on Saturday, prompting a lengthy rescue effort that ended late Sunday morning, when he was hoisted aboard an Oregon Army National Guard Blackhawk helicopter and flown to St. Charles Bend." To read more, click here.

--The Statesman Journal is reporting that, "climbing Oregon’s tallest mountain will likely require a new permit beginning in 2023. The U.S. Forest Service will propose a rule this month requiring anyone heading above 9,000 feet on Mount Hood to get a special permit that would cost around $20 per person, per climb, or $100 for a season, the agency told the Statesman Journal." To read more, click here.

--Some trail updates from Mt. Rainier National Park:

Sierra:

--Outside is reporting that, "Yosemite National Park officials are seeking the public’s help to track down the person or people responsible for spray-painting graffiti along one of the most popular trails in the park. On May 20, Yosemite officials received multiple calls alerting them to fresh graffiti on Yosemite Falls, and along one of the oldest trails in the park. Upon further investigation, rangers found 30 different areas tagged with blue and white spray paint. They also saw that rocks had been dislodged and strewn about. Photos released by the park showed writing including the word 'Fresno' and the number 559 (the city’s area code) written on the rock walls that line the trail. The resulting images varied in size from about one square foot to eight square feet in size." To read more, click here.

Desert Southwest:

--Arizona's Snowbowl resort is sacred to native Hopi people. They have fought the resort since it's development in the 1930s, and now there are plans for expansion. From The Guardian, "the battle is emblematic of a vast cultural divide in the American west over public lands and how they should be managed. On one side are mostly financially well-off white people who recreate in national forests and parks; on the other are Indigenous Americans dispossessed from those lands who are struggling to protect their sacred sites. 'Nuva’tukya’ovi is our Mount Sinai. Why can’t the forest service understand that?,' asks Preston." To read  more, click here.

--It doesn't look like the iconic joshua trees in Joshua Tree National Park will be designated as an endangered species. Climate change is a significant threat to this resident of the Mohave Desert. To read more, click here.

Colorado and Utah:

--The Denver Gazette is reporting that, "The family of Ronald LeMaster, a renowned Boulder ski instructor, is upset that prosecutors aren't pursuing manslaughter charges in LeMaster's skiing death. LeMaster died Nov. 30 in a violent collision with a snowboarder at Eldora Mountain Resort, on an intermediate run called Windmill Run, in what LeMaster considered his home ski area." To read more, click here.

--The New York Times is reporting that, "Bears Ears National Monument, whose red-rock landscape sprawls across more than 1.3 million acres in southeastern Utah, will be managed jointly by the federal government and Native American tribes in what administration officials said represents a “one-of-a-kind” model of cooperation." To read more, click here.

--St. George News is reporting that, "Two years following its original detection, the presence of toxic algal blooms in the northern part of the Virgin River and connecting water bodies continues to linger. Earlier this month the National Park Service reported that staff at Zion National Park continued to find evidence of the presence of toxic cyanobacteria in the North Fork of the Virgin River. The bacteria, which is produced by the algal blooms, has also continued to be detected in North Creek, and may also still persist in LaVerkin Creek." To read more, click here.

Notes from All Over:

--Colorado Newsline is reporting that, "the U.S. Interior Department will create a health and wellbeing program for wildland firefighters and boost spending on firefighting efforts by $103 million in fiscal 2022, Secretary Deb Haaland said Friday. The additional funding, which Haaland announced at the National Interagency Fire Center, comes as part of the $1.5 billion in last year’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure law signed into law by President Joe Biden that’s meant to address wildfires, which also directed the creation of mental health services for wildland firefighters." To read more, click here.