I occasionally blog for the Wyoming motel Flat Creek Inn in Jackson Hole. Last month, when the manager sent me a list of possible blogging topics, I scanned them for something that interested me. There was the usual smattering of promotions and invitations to view elk mating or whatever, but one topic caught my eye: the Yellowstone volcano. Because the Flat Creek Inn blog site can be a little cumbersome to navigate, here is the blog post printed in its entirety. (But go check out the Flat Creek Inn site sometime. Maybe I can score you some deals. Or direct you to some elk mating.)
Don’t let this put any wrinkles in your lovely Jackson Hole adventure, but it’s possible that a giant supervolcano will someday soon burst beneath the sandal-clad feet of thousands of hapless tourists, effectively eliminating much of the life in the western United States and ushering in a global nuclear winter. But also, we’re offering 20% off your motel stay, so there’s a half-full glass if we ever saw one. (More on that later!)
As the closest Jackson Hole lodging to Yellowstone National Park, we’re always concerned about natural conditions that may affect your next visit to the land of geysers and bison. And so it is only natural that we concern ourselves with the Yellowstone supervolcano, which could pretty much go off any day now, obliterating much of the American Northwest and making life unpleasant for a lot of other folks.
The volcano is among the largest silica-rich volcano fields in the world. It has lain dormant for 70,000 years, and scientists say the chance of it actually erupting is slim—one in 700,000, which is actually slightly more likely than we’re comfortable with.
If it were to go off, the resulting explosion would be one thousand times as powerful as the Mount Saint Helens eruption in 1980. The initial conflagration would kill as many as 90,000 people instantly and release a ten-foot layer of molten ash a thousand miles from the park. Sulfuric gases released into the atmosphere would mix with the planet’s water vapor. A gassy haze would settle over the country, both dimming the sunlight and cooling temperatures. Plant and animal life would suffer widespread extinction. Yellowstone tourism might even take a hit.
The Daily Mail, which supplied most of the information for this blog post, also included this cheery artist’s rendering of the catastrophe, in which Yellowstone is transformed into some sort of desolate, Mordor-like hellscape.
One does not simply walk into Yellowstone.
On the bright side, however, we have a deal going on, so there’s that. Enter the promo code "Secret20" when booking your motel stay and get 20 percent off! (This deal starts September 1.) Enjoy the rest of your summer!
