Park officials announced the Furnace Creek area of the park, near the Nevada-California state line, underwent 1.7 inches of rain, which they defined as "nearly an entire year's worth of rain in one morning."
The officials further explained that roughly 60 vehicles were buried by the rushing floodwaters, and 500 park visitors and 500 park workers were left stranded, though no injuries have been reported.
The California Department of Transportation stated it might take four to six hours to clear the main road out of the park, enabling visitors to leave.
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"All roads into and out of the park are currently closed and will remain closed until park staff can assess the extensiveness of the situation," the National Park Service announced Friday. A park statement stated Friday's rainstorms and floods "pushed dumpster containers into parked cars, which caused cars to collide into one another."
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"Additionally, many facilities are flooded, including hotel rooms and business offices," the statement went on. The park further confirmed a water system that services park residents and offices failed after a line that was being repaired broke because of the floods.
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Before Friday's rains, the notoriously dry park had only experienced 0.04 inches of rain in 2022, making it a historically dry year.
The rain began at approximately 2 AM, park visitor and photographer John Sirlin told CBS. Sirlin was trying to take pictures of the lightning as the storm approached. "It was more extreme than anything I've seen there," he announced. Sirlin has been visiting the park since 2016 and chasing storms since the 1990s.
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"I've never seen it to the point where entire trees and boulders were washing down. The noise from some of the rocks coming down the mountain was just incredible," he announced Friday afternoon. The flash flood cautioning was removed for the park just after noon on Friday, yet a flood advisory is still in effect, according to the National Weather Service.
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Specialists say that the ever-increasing concentrations of heat-trapping gases, mainly from the combustion of fossil fuels, have caused the average temperature to rise by 1.1 degrees Celsius, or two degrees Fahrenheit, every year since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution.
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And with each degree Celsius the temperature increases, the air can hold 7 percent more moisture, leading to more severe storms.
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Making matters worse, flooding associated with sea level rise is already accelerating, according to an annual report issued Tuesday by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
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"Sea level rise impacts are happening now, and are growing rapidly," William Sweet explains in the report, stressing that the rising sea level could exacerbate flooding from storms, which push more ocean water onto land.
The saltwater could further fill underground drainage pipes, which suggests rainwater could back up and collect in the streets.
By 2050, the report estimates, high tides could send water into neighborhoods dozens of days each year.
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