The lake formerly known as the Bonneville Salt Flats

[famartin]

Thought some of you might find this fascinating... I took these pictures a week ago on my drive back from SLC. The first 6 were taken about 30 miles east of the Nevada state line, while the second 6 were taken at the rest area about 10 miles east of the Nevada state line.

http://www.njfreeway...e_City/02-2010/

[nzucker]

These are just beautiful...very strange lake and the mountains look great

[Quakertown needs snow]

Nice series Ray

[aslkahuna]

Thought some of you might find this fascinating... I took these pictures a week ago on my drive back from SLC. The first 6 were taken about 30 miles east of the Nevada state line, while the second 6 were taken at the rest area about 10 miles east of the Nevada state line.

http://www.njfreeway...e_City/02-2010/

Here's one of the same lake though taken in the SUMMER of 1983 from the rest area with Pilot Peak in the background. Usually water will collect on the surface of the salt flats after heavy rain/snow events in the winter but usually evaporates off by Summer. The Summers of 1982 and 1983 though were extremely wet in Utah and the actual GSL Lake level was so high that water percolated into the flats creating a lake which stayed there for years. Of course now, they have that canal in place to drain excess water from the GSL into the flats. The high lake levels of the 1980's cost Utah a great deal of money as they had to raise the roadbed of I-80 twice after it got flooded and rebuild an interchange. The State beaches were overwashed and the Saltair Pavilion destroyed by wave action. Farmland north of Grantsville was flooded by the lake. It was an interesting time to be in UT weatherwise, but we never knew from week to week which if any roads we had that we could use to drive from Dugway to SLC or Tooele.

Steve

[donsutherland1]

Stunning photos.

[famartin]

Here's one of the same lake though taken in the SUMMER of 1983 from the rest area with Pilot Peak in the background. Usually water will collect on the surface of the salt flats after heavy rain/snow events in the winter but usually evaporates off by Summer. The Summers of 1982 and 1983 though were extremely wet in Utah and the actual GSL Lake level was so high that water percolated into the flats creating a lake which stayed there for years. Of course now, they have that canal in place to drain excess water from the GSL into the flats. The high lake levels of the 1980's cost Utah a great deal of money as they had to raise the roadbed of I-80 twice after it got flooded and rebuild an interchange. The State beaches were overwashed and the Saltair Pavilion destroyed by wave action. Farmland north of Grantsville was flooded by the lake. It was an interesting time to be in UT weatherwise, but we never knew from week to week which if any roads we had that we could use to drive from Dugway to SLC or Tooele.

Steve

I've heard some of those stories before. On the other end of my CWA, they had to dredge a channel between the Humboldt and Carson Sinks to prevent I-80 from being flooded. Lovelock Airport was closed for several YEARS due to the flooding on the Humboldt Sink.

[A-L-E-X]

These are just beautiful...very strange lake and the mountains look great

That looks like the place where the extremophile microbes live. Or the one where the brain-eating amoeba were found. But those were in Cali.

[aslkahuna]

I've heard some of those stories before. On the other end of my CWA, they had to dredge a channel between the Humboldt and Carson Sinks to prevent I-80 from being flooded. Lovelock Airport was closed for several YEARS due to the flooding on the Humboldt Sink.

There was a lot of flooding like that throughout the Interior West and Southwest those years. The Christmas snow of 1983 dropped so much snow at Dugway that we kept a cover until the Spring thaw. In January 1984 we had some really cold weather and because so much fresh water had entered the GSL, the salinity had dropped to the point where the lake actually iced up-a very rare event that I have a photo of.

Steve