Feds propose blasting away dangerous rock slab from near exit of Utah’s Timpanogos Cave

Feds propose blasting hanging rock from Utah cave

SALT LAKE CITY — A 30-foot slab of protruding limestone near the outside exit of Utah’s popular Timpanogos Cave is expected to be blasted away this spring in hopes of eliminating the risk that it might fall on visitors.

Cave officials on Tuesday released an environmental analysis of the proposal, which also includes a new set of stairs and a sturdier roof near the cave’s exit.

Falling rocks are a regular concern on the trail to the cave but the massive slab near the exit is particularly worrisome, said Denis Davis, superintendent of Timpanogos Cave National Monument. Part of it is directly above the cave’s sheltered exit and has the potential to maim or kill anyone below, park officials said.

A geologist who inspected the rock formation said it could fall away from the cliff at any time.

“He said it could be there for another 100 years or more or it could come down tomorrow,” Davis said. “But one of these days it’s going to come out of there.”

He’s hoping a blast crew will come out in April — before the cave opens to the public in May — to remove the slab that’s about 30 feet long, two feet high and four feet deep.

The hazards don’t end there, though.

Monument officials say the exit area still poses a danger, especially from high-velocity rocks falling silently through the air from the cliff above.

The new stairway nearby would bypass the most hazardous area and a larger roof around the exit will provide extra safety, monument officials said. That work — part of a $500,000 project funded by the federal stimulus — is expected to be finished sometime this summer.

The hazards will never be eliminated, Davis said, but park officials are trying to reduce the risks.

There are near-misses from falling rocks nearly every year, including along the mile-plus trail to the cave’s entrance. The only fatality, though, was in 1933.

The 250-acre national monument, which includes three caverns, is about 30 miles south of Salt Lake City and gets about 80,000 visitors a year.

On the Net:

www.nps.gov/tica/index.htm