The quagmire seems to be over. Tens of thousands of Burning Man festival-goers began returning home on Monday, September 4. They had been stuck for several days in the Black Rock desert – giving its name to Black Rock City, the ephemeral city of festival-goers – in the American state of Nevada, metamorphosed into thick and sticky mud after heavy rains.
Access to Black Rock City, a few dozen kilometers from the first dwellings, had been closed to 70,000 festival-goers on Friday due to bad weather which transformed the “playa”, a huge open-air field, into an impassable muddy expanse. Organizers, however, called on visitors to delay their departure from the site – built in the dry bed of a lake in a remote area of ????the Nevada desert – until Tuesday to avoid major traffic jams.
But burners, dressed in eccentric outfits that characterize them, left the site as soon as permission was given. Some walked overnight to reach the only passable road, 8 kilometers away, and hitchhike. Among them, celebrities, such as comedian Chris Rock and artist Diplo were hitchhiked by a fan. An approach that did not please other festival-goers, respecting the instructions issued by the authorities and remaining on site.
Elsewhere in Nevada, the rains led to flooding, including in the city of Las Vegas. According to state police, bad weather at the festival caused the death of one person, but authorities did not release details of the circumstances. The Burning Man had faced an intense heat wave last year with strong winds which had already made the experience difficult for festival-goers.
