Two Iconic New Mexico Rock Formations Collapse Weeks Apart: the Alien Throne and the King of Wings, Toppled by Weeks of Rain and Flooding
Two celebrated natural rock formations in the high desert of northwestern New Mexico, the Alien Throne and the King of Wings, have collapsed within weeks of each other. The Associated Press reported on November 6 that the same wind, rain and time that sculpted them ultimately toppled them, after weeks of storms and flooding across the southwestern United States.
The Alien Throne stands, or stood, on the edge of the Ah-Shi-Sle-Pah Wilderness and is known in Navajo as Tsé Bináká Níyol. Kialo Winters, founder of Navajo Tours USA, who regularly shares this piece of his homeland with visitors, rounded a bend on the afternoon of October 30 and found the landmark in pieces; he said his heart dropped. Poor road conditions had kept him away for a couple of weeks, and he had seen no other posts about the feature's status.
The nearby King of Wings was famous for a roughly 20-foot slab of rock jutting out like a diving board. Word of its demise began circulating on social media in early October, when visitors documented the slab on the ground beside the mound of clay on which it once stood; based on visitor photos and social media reports, it is believed to have collapsed on or before October 9. Winters said new holes were forming in the throne and cracks along the wing's base, so their eventual fall was no surprise.
The formations are hefty planks of sandstone balanced atop spindly pedestals of clay, elaborately eroded over the seasons. Experts estimate that more than 20 trillion gallons (75.7 trillion liters) of rain fell across the Four Corners states (New Mexico, Colorado, Utah and Arizona) and Nevada during late October and early November, as tropical moisture was funneled into the region. Rivers crested, floodwaters coursed through usually dry washes, homes were destroyed and the soil was further saturated. The water is receding and cleanup is under way, but officials estimate the damage could stretch into the hundreds of millions of dollars.
(Source: Associated Press)
Source: Associated Press
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：新墨西哥州「外星王座」岩柱坍塌前的景象（资料图）。snowpeak 摄，CC BY 2.0，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / Photo: The Alien Throne hoodoo in New Mexico before its collapse (file photo). By snowpeak, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
