After heavy rainfall caused thick mud to inundate roadways, tens of thousands of Burning Man revelers were left stranded in a remote section of the Nevada desert.
Videos shared on social media on Saturday show ankle-deep mud throughout Black Rock City, a temporary city erected for the annual week-long event. People can be seen in the clips sloshing around with garbage bags or Ziploc bags over their feet to avoid getting stuck in the pasty mud.
Access to and from Black Rock City was closed “for the remainder of the event” after rainfall pummeled the area Friday night and Saturday morning, turning the sandy desert into thick mud, organizers said in a statement emailed to Newsweek on Saturday night. The weather was so severe it triggered a “shelter in place” alert, where attendees were urged to conserve food, water and fuel.
SCOTT NELSON / AFP/Getty
Burning Man is held in a remote part of the Black Rock Desert in Nevada roughly 100 miles from Reno. The event, which dates to 1986, draws more than 60,000 attendees to Black Rock City to dance, make art and witness the burning of a massive wooden effigy known as the Man, according to the event’s website. Burning Man, scheduled this year from August 27 to September 4, has been postponed as attendees, also called “burners,” are trapped by the inclement weather hitting the area.
Some burners, including a few celebrities, decided to ditch their muddy campsites by hiking several miles to the nearest road, according to videos shared on social media.
In one clip, DJ Diplo told his 2.4 million X followers that he hiked five miles with his friend, comedian Chris Rock, before they were able to hitch a ride from a fan.
“Just walked 5 miles in the mud out of burning man with chris rock and a fan picked us up,” Diplo posted.
Shortly after Diplo shared the video on X, the Washoe County Sheriff’s Department posted about the closure of the entrance to Burning Man for the remainder of the event. Officials warned that anyone driving near the area will be “turned around.” People attending the event are urged to wait at their campsites.
Newsweek reached out via email to the Washoe Sheriff’s Office for comment.
Burning Man, according to the website, is not a festival but rather a “community and global cultural movement” that is based on 10 countercultural principles, such as radical self-expression. The Burning Man website warns that attendees are responsible for their own survival and must be ready for harsh desert conditions.
The Burning Man Project, a non-profit group headquartered in San Francisco, California that organizes the event told Newsweek in an email on Saturday that the people attending the event are prepared for extreme weather.
Dominique Debucquoy-Dodley, a spokesperson for the Burning Man Project, told Newsweek that attendees are urged to “wait it out.”
“Burning Man is a community of people who are prepared to support one another,” Debucquoy-Dodley said to Newsweek. “We have come here knowing this is a place where we bring everything we need to survive. It is because of this that we are all well-prepared for a weather event like this.”
The Burning Man Project, according to the statement, has conducted “table-top drills for events like this” and is working to set up mobile-cell trailers and busses off site. Attendees are urged to follow Burning Man accounts on social media and check the website for more information and updates
“Get some rest and spend some quality time with your campmates,” Debucquoy-Dodley said. “We will all get out of this, it will just take time.”
The gate and airport into Black Rock City are closed and no driving is permitted into or out of the city except for emergency vehicles, the organizers said on X, formerly Twitter.
Reminder: The gate & airport in & out of Black Rock City remain closed. Ingress & egress are halted for the time being, including Burner Express Air and Bus. No driving is permitted on playa except for emergency vehicles. If you are in BRC, please shelter in place & stay safe.
— Burning Man Traffic (@bmantraffic) September 3, 2023
With more rain in the forecast, conditions are expected to get worse. All burns are postponed as of Saturday evening, including the famed igniting of the Man, according to the website.
Philip Lewis, an editor for HuffPost, shared a roughly 40-second video on X that shows burners and their campsites covered in mud.
“Tens of thousands of people attending the Burning Man festival in the Nevada desert are being told to conserve food, water and fuel as they shelter in place after a heavy rainstorm,” Lewis posted.
In a clip shared on TikTok, user bryfreeman posted about his trek in the mud to the bathroom.
A viral TikTok video, which garnered more than a million views in four hours on Saturday after it was posted by user ninja__natalie, appears to show a jeep stuck in deep mud.
