NATIONAL PARK SERVICE

MORNING REPORT

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

INCIDENTS

Great Smoky Mountains NP

Park Recovering From Christmas Eve Wind Event

The staff at Great Smoky Mountains National Park is in the process of recovering from an extreme wind/rain event that swept through the area on the night of December 24th. Park weather stations recorded wind gusts of 70 to 100 mph during the night, and, by Christmas morning, thousands of fallen trees and debris blocked nearly all of the park's roads, including Newfound Gap Road (U.S. Hwy 441), Foothills Parkway East, Foothills Parkway West, Gatlinburg Bypass, Cherokee Orchard Road, Cataloochee Entrance Road, Old NC 284 (between Big Creek and Cataloochee), and Lakeview Drive. The wind event comes on the heels of a snow storm a week earlier that dropped up to 28 inches of snow, closing the Newfound Gap Road until December 23rd. Park road crews were called in at 3 a.m. on Christmas morning to clear the Newfound Gap Road, where several vehicles were trapped by fallen trees, including an elderly couple, both of whom were having medical issues. The male was short on bottled oxygen and the wife was having cardiac symptoms. Both were examined by Gatlinburg EMS, later recovered, and left by POV. The Twin Creeks Science Center greenhouse was badly damaged and all the native plant materials being propagated in it were destroyed by frost. The historic Caughron Barn in Cades Cove was totally flattened. A condition assessment of other park structures is still pending. As of December 29th, all park roads had been reopened except Old 284 between Cataloochee and Big Creek and the Cataloochee Entrance Road, which are still blocked by hundreds of trees. Crews are still at work to clear those secondary routes. Park managers expect damage to trails to be very extensive, because the wind was accompanied by up to 2.69 inches of rain on top of snowmelt from the 20 plus inches of snow that remained from the December 18th-19th storm. They expect to find thousands of downed trees, as well as washouts and slides. [Bob Miller, Management Assistant]

Point Reyes NS

Ranger Successfully Intervenes In Attempted Suicide

On December 25th, ranger Eric Peterson came upon a car parked at Limantour Beach with a woman standing unsteadily outside it. She then got back inside. When he checked her to see if she was okay, he noted that she appeared to have an altered state of consciousness. She told the ranger that she wanted to kill herself and that she'd taken some pills. Peterson continued to talk with her until Marin County paramedics arrived and took her to the hospital, where she was admitted for a mental health evaluation. [David Schifsky, Chief Ranger]

OTHER NEWS

The following stories are among those in today's edition of InsideNPS:

Fort Sumter NM - Fort Sumter has received a $6,000 National Park Foundation grant for field trips to historic Morris Island. Photo.

Tallgrass Prairie NP - On Sunday, November 15th, two people visiting the park became the 250,000th and 250,001st visitors to Tallgrass Prairie NP, established as an NPS area in 1996. Photo.

Intermountain Region - On December 11th, Western National Parks Association honored Pecos NHP's chief of interpretation, Christine Beekman, and the staff at Padre Island NS with superior performance awards. Photo.

To see these and other stories posted on InsideNPS (or NPS Digest, its public version), click on one or the other of the following links (please note that not all stories in the former appear in the latter):

NPS employees: HYPERLINK "http://inside.nps.gov/index.cfm?handler=index" http://inside.nps.gov/index.cfm?handler=index

Non-NPS employees: HYPERLINK "http://home.nps.gov/applications/digest/" http://home.nps.gov/applications/digest/

NPS serious incident submission standards can be found at the following web site: HYPERLINK "http://inside.nps.gov/waso/custompages.cfm?prg=45&id=8728&lv=2&pgid=3504" http://inside.nps.gov/waso/custompages.cfm?prg=45&id=8728&lv=2&pgid=3504

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Prepared by the Division of Law Enforcement, Security and Emergency Services, Washington Office, with the support of the Office of the Chief Information Officer. Edited by Bill Halainen ( HYPERLINK "mailto:Bill_Halainen@nps.gov" Bill_Halainen@nps.gov).

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