A week after the famous Burning Man festival kicked off in Nevada desert, a nightmare unfolded for thousands of revelers who found themselves stranded at the soggy event venue. The festival site Black Rock City was closed for vehicles after an unusual late summer storm, accompanied by rain, had turned it into an expanse of mud. However, the visitors finally began their exodus from the campsite on Monday after the muddy roads dried up enough for them to travel. But first, what is the Burning Man festival? In 1986, Larry Harvey and Jerry James started the Burning Man festival as a small function to celebrate the summer solstice on San Francisco's Baker Beach. The festival got its name from its concluding event, the burning of a large wooden structure called 'The Man' on the final night. A wooden structure called 'The Temple' is also burnt, along with a fireworks show. The event was held every year at Baker Beach until authorities intervened in 1990, according to The New York Times. It then moved to Black Rock Desert in Nevada, where 350 revelers were in attendance, up from the 35 that attended the first Burning Man in 1986. The site in Black Rock Desert sits atop the erstwhile Lake Lahontan, which existed 15,000 years ago. Every year, over 60,000 people gather at the festival. transforming it into a temporary city to engage in creating art and community. This year, the festival was scheduled to run from August 27 until September 4. A regular ticket costs $575. pic.twitter.com/rwJgRQgVmw — SHIMZA (@Shimza01) September 5, 2023 The crowds grew, so did the festival Local media reported there were more than 70,000 "burners" in Black Rock City this year. Burners usually arrive in groups and set up themed "camps". The festival runs on a "gift economy" philosophy where attendees provide goods or services without the expectation of receiving anything in return. On the down side, the festival is infamously associated with nudity, sex and drug use. Most of the 16 arrests at the event last year were for drug possession, according to The Reno Gazette Journal. What happened on September 2 Black Rock City received more than half an inch of rain on the intervening night of Friday and Saturday, stranding tens of thousands of revelers. As the event's site was closed for the remainder of the event, organisers asked attendees to take shelter and conserve food and water. The US Bureau of Land Management, the agency that manages the land on which the event takes place, said, "More rain is expected over the next few days and conditions are not expected to improve enough to allow vehicles to enter the playa." The Reno Gazette Journal reported that with vehicular traffic on halt, portable toilets were unable to be serviced. Many social media posts showed attendees walking through mud, often ankle-deep, but in good spirits. Updates from the playa, collapsed shade structures, destroyed shiftpods and flooded tents. Thankfully no one got seriously injured and some of our friends in RVs at camp are taking in displaced campers pic.twitter.com/6M4JsUFJW9 — Sol (@sol_flac) September 2, 2023 What happened on September 3 Adding to the confusion and worries of attendees, a death at the festival site was reported, which Reno Gazette Journal later quoted the medical examiner's office to attribute to drug intoxication. Organisers encouraged participants to remain calm. They said cellphone trailers were being dropped in several locations Saturday night and that they would be briefly opening up internet overnight. By Sunday, many attempted to walk five miles along a dirt road from the event site to Gerlach, the town where shuttle buses were arranged to take attendees to Reno. Hundreds completed the journey, but many got stuck as the normally dusty lake bed remained marshy. Celebrity DJ Diplo posted a video showing him and comedian Chris Rock riding on the back of a fan’s pickup truck, a luxury they stumbled upon after walking six miles through the mud. “I legit walked the side of the road for hours with my thumb out,” he wrote. Yes we all know burning man ended in ebola, cannibalism and people drowning in puddles but I wanna talk about the double rainbows, the mud sculptures the sunsets, the great people and the excellent music I got to play with great friends … the community and the self reliance that… pic.twitter.com/IFKaNJCuGs — diplo (@diplo) September 5, 2023 Despite the conditions, videos on media showed costumed revelers sliding through the mud, most covered in wet earth. Organisers were unable to say when roads would "be dry enough for RVs or vehicles to navigate safely". The burn was postponed to Monday night as muddy conditions and rain stood in the way of moving fire safety equipment to the site. This was the second postponement of the burn, which was to be held on Saturday night. What happened on September 4 Organisers said early they would likely formally allow vehicles to leave at noon Monday local time, even as photos shared online showed recreational vehicles sunk up to the tyre rims in mud. The road leading out of Black Rock city was opened around 2 pm local time, but 64,000 people remained on site to watch the burn. A long line of vehicles inched along in a traffic jam in the desert as event organisers urged drivers to consider delaying their departure until Tuesday to reduce traffic. The Burning Man account on social media platform X estimated "exodus" travel time at "7 hours and climbing". "The Man” was torched Monday night while the temple was set to go up in flames 8 pm Tuesday. At this time, the National Weather Service in Reno said some light rain could pass through Tuesday morning. Who all have attended the festival, how has it changed? The festival attracts a mix of dedicated and new revelers each year, often being host to technocrats, influencers and celebrities. Paris Hilton was a DJ there in 2017. Mark Zuckerberg has also attended Burning Man, while Elon Musk has visited Black Rock City almost every year for the past two decades. According to a survey completed annually by festival volunteers, the average Burner is getting older (the average age last year was 37, compared with 32 in 2013) and wealthier, according to The New York Times. Attendees are still mostly white, with 13 per cent identifying themselves as people of colour. Burning Man has seen disruptions before Disruptions are a part of the event's recent history. Organisers had to temporarily close the entrance to the festival in 2018 due to dust storms, while the event was cancelled twice during the pandemic and held virtually. Activists breathe fire on Burning Man Burning Man came under fire from geologists and activists for the damage to the ecosystem by revelers, with climate activists causing an hour-long traffic jam at the start of the festival, when they blocked the road to the venue. Protesters from a coalition of climate activists Seven Circles demanded a ban on private jets, single-use plastics, and unlimited generator and propane use at the festival, The Guardian reported. It's too bad that #BurningMan did not consult an ephemeral lake geologist to learn proactively what happens when it rains on a dry lake bed in the desert. The scars left by people on this ecosystem will last for a long time. — Kathy Benison (@KathyBenison) September 3, 2023 A sustainability report by festival organisers, however, talked of launching pilot programmes for solar panels, offsetting their emissions through purchasing carbon credits, and supporting sustainability-minded camps to achieve the goal of becoming carbon-negative by 2030. Burning Man climate protestors have now been arrested. Nevada ranger told me they received a 911 call saying that someone in the crowd was going to shoot the activists… And this was somehow their reason for charging in, guns blazing? pic.twitter.com/pT60boYN4g — michelle lh࿊࿊q (@MichelleLhooq) August 28, 2023 America sees extreme weather events, more to come Within the months of July and August, heat took temperatures in central US to "well-above normal to record-breaking", prompting closure of schools in Wisconsin, Colorado and Iowa and food banks to be shut in Nebraska. Record heat waves were witnessed in Miami, Phoenix and Arizona. Miami saw extreme heat for 46 days in a row and the others for 31 days. Heavy flooding was witnessed in Alaska and Vermont, while at least 115 lives were claimed by fires on the island of Maui. Hurricane Hilary ravaged California and brought record rainfall to Los Angeles even as Death Valley received a year's rainfall in a day and saw the temperature rise to a near-world record of 53 degrees Celsius. Tropical storm Idalia hit the gulf coast of Florida and brought heavy rains, coastal flooding and tornados to the South Carolina coastline. The Union of Concerned Scientists said that 103.7 million Americans live in areas that are under extreme weather alerts. Further, just the first seven months of 2023 were marked by the most billion-dollar disasters in US of any year since 1980, according to scientists from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information. Other music events hit by bad weather Last month, the World Scout Jamboree in South Korea was hit by heat and typhoons, forcing its cancellation. Beyonce's concert in Washington DC in August was significantly delayed amid severe weather conditions while Lionel Richie's joint concert with Earth, Wind & Fire went ahead without the former as he was unable to land in New York due to bad weather. Last month, Depeche Mode's Finland concert was cancelled owing to a forecast of stormy conditions in Helsinki. Meanwhile in India, AR Rahman's August 12 concert in Chennai was cancelled due to "persistent rains" even as many attendees were on their way to the venue. My Dearest Friends …Owing to adverse weather conditions and persistent rains, it is only made advisable for the health and safety of my beloved fans and friends to reschedule the concert to the nearest best date, with the guidance of the statutory authorities. More details on… pic.twitter.com/HRAyqo5y0n — A.R.Rahman (@arrahman) August 12, 2023 With inputs from agencies
