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Yellowstone National Park is a treasure that inspires awe in travelers from around the world. New Zealand and Iceland are known for geysers, but nowhere are there as many as in Yellowstone. At the heart of Yellowstone's past, present, and future lies volcanism. About 2 million years ago, then 1.2 million years ago, and again 600.000 years ago, huge volcanic eruptions occurred here. The latest spewed out nearly 240 cubic miles of debris. The park's present central portion collapsed, forming a 28 by 47-miles caldera, or basin - see dashed outline on large map. The magmatic heat powering those eruptions still powers the park's geysers, hot springs, fumaroles, and mud pots. The Grand Canyon of the Yel-lowstone gives a glimpse of Earth's interior: its waterfalls highlight the bounda-ries of the lava flows and thermal areas. Rugged mountains flank the park's vol-canic plateau, rewarding both eye and spirit. Yellowstone's wildlife includes the American bison (buffalo), elk, grizzly and black bears etc. Vegetation types range from near-desert vegetation to sub alpine meadows and forests on Mount Washburn. Lodge pole pine covers 60 percent of the park and makes up 80 per-cent of the forested areas. Yellowstone would be a premier national park for its scenery of wildlife alone, but its history resonated with colourful tales of fur trappers - Jim Bridger and Osborne Russell - and explorers and surveyors, pho-tographers and artists. William Henry Jackson's photographs and Thomas Moran's sketches influenced Congress to establish Yellowstone as the world's first national park in 1872. This national park idea has become a land-use model for many nations, and Yellowstone has evolved from a pleasuring ground and wildlife refuge to today's International Biosphere Reserve and World Heritage site, too.
Fire
Absent for hundreds of years, large fires returned to the aging forests of Yellow-stone in the summer of 1988. Driven by powerful and capricious winds and fed by desert-dry fuels, small fires quickly merged into larger ones which grew into giants. By summer's end, flames had touched, in some way, nearly 800.000 acres of the Yellowstone landscape. Fires of the size and intensity of those that burned in Yellowstone in 1988 have swept through the region many times. Since the retreat of glacial ice from the plateau, nearly 12.000 years ago, massive fires have periodically cleansed, invigorated, and diversified the forests of Yellow-stone. Perhaps every 300 to 350 years, they will revisit the area again, and they may be dwarfed in many magnitude by other natural events.
Landscapes are continually altered by a kaleidoscopic array of forces. Among the instruments of change are: weather, erosion, plant succession, glaciation, earthquakes, floods, human activities, and fire. Change is an immutable charac-teristic of the process we call nature. There is no beginning nor end to that proc-ess. One series of changes simply merges into another, often slowly and subtly, sometimes quickly and on a grand scale. Thus it was Yellowstone in 1988. Fire has increased Yellowstone's biological diversity, strengthened its ecological as-sociations, and enhanced its human values. Yellowstone has been enriched, not impoverished, by fire.
1988 FIRE FACTS
. About 793.880 acres, 36% of the park, burned within Yellowstone National Park.
. Of the 249 different fires in the greater Yellowstone area, fire-fighters kept 201 (81%) from growing larger than 10 acres.
. Many fires burned together, forming huge fire complexes that covered miles of steep, rugged backcountry.
. Forests fires can burn at temperatures of more than 1.200 degrees Fahrenheit.
. The Mink fire (in southeast Yellowstone) released enough energy to heat 4.400 homes for one year.
. The last fire in the greater Yellowstone area declared out on November 19. ("Black Saturday")
. On-the-ground surveys following the fires found 269 elk, 4 deer, 2 moose, 9 bison, and 6 black bears that died as a result of the fires.
. Fire suppression efforts in the greater Yellowstone area cost about $120 mil-lion.
Norris Geyser Basin
Steamboat Geyser, the world's largest, erupts at irregular intervals of days to years. Echinus Geyser erupts about once per hour. Porcelain Basin is the park's hottest exposed area
Historically, the Norris area was the site of a U.S. Army outpost. The Norris Soldier Station is a link to Yellowstone's past. From 1886 to 1916, the U.S: Army administered Yellowstone National Park, and the Soldier Station is a relic of that era. Today it houses the Museum of the National Park Ranger. Exhibits tell the story of the evolution of the ranger profession from its roots in the mili-tary to the modern specialists.
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