• Email Us: [email protected]
  • Contact Us: +1 718 874 1545
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Medical Market Report

  • Home
  • All Reports
  • About Us
  • Contact Us

Grisly Incident In Yellowstone National Park Shows Just How Dangerous This Vibrant Wilderness Can Be

July 5, 2025 by Deborah Bloomfield

A bison got into hot water in the most literal sense in Yellowstone Park on June 21, 2025. The fatal error was witnessed by visitors to the park who saw it stumble into a shallow area before disappearing into deeper water. These springs are so difficult to navigate safely that the decision has been made not to remove the animal, which will be nothing but bones before long, and marks a stark reminder of how dangerous this vibrant wilderness can be.

The grisly incident unfolded at the Grand Prismatic Spring in Yellowstone National Park, where the water simmers at an eye-watering 89°C (192°F). There are multiple images on the internet that demonstrate how wild animals will sometimes wander close to these colorful pools. They will be able to feel the heat, of course, but that doesn’t always mean they’ll back off, and there have been numerous sightings of unlucky animals falling in, as well as surprise discoveries of their remains.

An elk calf met the same fate in the mud pots of West Thumb Geyser Basin a few years ago, and one body of water is so infamous for it that it’s been nicknamed Skeleton Pool. Then there was the study that peered into the Doublet Pool at Geyser Hill near Old Faithful and stumbled upon a very clean (and really quite beautiful) elk skeleton.

Elk skeleton at the bottom of Doublet Pool on Geyser Hill near Old Faithful, imaged by an underwater camera in 2022.

Elk skeleton at the bottom of Doublet Pool on Geyser Hill near Old Faithful, imaged by an underwater camera in 2022.

Image credit: Mara Reed, University of California, Berkeley, under research permit YELL-2022-SCI-8058

Part of the perilous nature of these springs is that crusts form at the edges that may feel to wild animals like solid ground. When these break, it can dip the animal into hot water, and the panic to get out may send them deeper in, as was the fate of our ill-fated bison.

“The recent death of a bison at Grand Prismatic Spring is an emphatic example of the danger posed by thermal areas in Yellowstone National Park, but there are some common misconceptions about what makes the hot springs so dangerous,” wrote the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory. 

“Many visitors to Yellowstone believe that all of the hot springs in the park are acidic (pH lower than 5), and that the water will cause an acid burn on contact and dissolve any animals or people that fall into the springs.  But nearly all major hot springs and geysers in Yellowstone are actually neutral (pH of around 7) or alkaline (pH greater than 7), including almost all of the geysers and hot springs in the famous thermal basins along the Firehole River.”

“What kills most animals and occasionally people who fall into hot springs is not acidity, but temperature.  Many hot springs are at or near boiling temperatures, and animal life will not survive for long when exposed, even if only briefly, to water that hot. This is why staying on boardwalks in thermal areas of Yellowstone National Park is a requirement and is so important for visitor safety.”  

A bad day for a bison, but it would be a fitting legacy if it could remind even just one person to stick to a safe distance while taking in Yellowstone’s magnificent but deadly water features. Though beautiful, there are perils to be found all around in nature. Just look at the cougar who demonstrated what to do if you want to become a great fossil.

Deborah Bloomfield
Deborah Bloomfield

Related posts:

  1. Who to blame for Taliban takeover? Former Afghan envoy points finger at Kabul
  2. Uber faces legal action over ‘racially discriminatory’ facial recognition ID checks
  3. Twitter Says It Is No Longer Stopping Any COVID-19 Misinformation
  4. Sapphires Are Cooked Up By Volcanic Fury – And Now We Know How

Source Link: Grisly Incident In Yellowstone National Park Shows Just How Dangerous This Vibrant Wilderness Can Be

Filed Under: News

Primary Sidebar

  • “I Saved A PNG Image To A Bird”: YouTuber Stores 176KB Drawing Of A Bird Inside A Bird’s Song
  • The Falkland Islands Wolf: The Tragic Tale Of The First Known Canid Humans Drove To Extinction
  • There’s A Forever Chemical That’s In Your Water, Food, And Blood — And Levels Are “Increasing Irreversibly”
  • “World’s Rarest Bear” Captured On Camera In Mongolian Desert – With A Baby!
  • Alligators Eat Rocks For An Incredibly Smart Reason
  • New Study Raises “Disturbing Prospect” About Alien Civilizations Using Dyson Swarms
  • The Khamar-Daban Incident Is So Strange It Is Known As “Buryatia’s Dyatlov Pass”
  • Zebroids, Zeedonks, Zorses, Zonies: Welcome To The World Of Zebra Hybrids
  • How Far Into The Universe Can You See With Your Naked Eye?
  • “Rarest Baryon Decay Ever Observed So Far” Found In Experiment That Wasn’t Even Looking For It
  • Scientists “Read Minds” By Opening The Brain’s “Filing Cabinet” Of Memories
  • 4,000-Year-Old Ancient Egyptian Handprint Discovered On “Soul House” Tomb Offering
  • Dogs Can Smell Parkinson’s Disease Years Before Symptoms Appear With Incredible Accuracy
  • The Longest-Reigning Monarch
  • Adorable Boxer Crabs Filmed “Cloning” Their Living Anemone Gloves For The First Time
  • Watch An Adorable Little Crab Hitch A Ride On A Mosaic Jellyfish Through The Gulf Of Thailand
  • COVID Vaccines Saved An Incredible 2.5 Million Lives In The First 4 Years Of The Pandemic
  • NASA Has Made A Sizable Error In Lunar And Martian Physics, Study Suggests
  • Disappearing Stars In The 1950s Associated With UAPs And Nuclear Weapons Tests
  • These Are The “New Seasons” Scientists Think Are Emerging Because Of Climate Change
  • Business
  • Health
  • News
  • Science
  • Technology
  • +1 718 874 1545
  • +91 78878 22626
  • [email protected]
Office Address
Prudour Pvt. Ltd. 420 Lexington Avenue Suite 300 New York City, NY 10170.

Powered by Prudour Network

Copyrights © 2025 · Medical Market Report. All Rights Reserved.

Go to mobile version