Racetrack "Sailing Stones" Witnessed... Mystery Solved!

"Sailing stone" on the Racetrack, Death Valley

In one of the enduring mysteries of the world, people have long wondered how rocks move across a horizontal dry lake bed surface in Death Valley National Park.

People have offered a variety of theories on how the rocks moved, with the first scientific study in 1948 suggesting dust devils.

More recently, high winds were suggested:

Using Differential GPS to Map the "Sliding" Rocks of Racetrack Playa
"So the evidence suggests that strong gusts of wind and swirling dust devils, in combination with a slick playa surface may set even the heaviest the rocks in motion. Off they go, scooting along downwind until friction slows them down and they come to rest. There the stones wait for the next time when slippery mud and wind spur them into action again." http://www.profsurv.com/magazine/article.aspx?i=769#sthash.WI0c906F.dpuf

In 2008 Ralph Lorenz of Johns Hopkins University proposed that the rocks moved when embedded in bouyant "ice cakes", as had been witnessed in tidal areas in the arctic.
"The stones partially embedded in the floating ice rise slightly above the bottom with the increasing level of water. Both the friction between the ice and water and between the stones and the bed are very small, so that blowing wind with some intensity pushes the ice (and the rocks embedded). If the stones and mud at the bottom have a light touch, the dragged stones leave a trail that remains once the ice has melted and the water has evaporated." http://blogs.egu.eu/gsoil/2013/08/26/ladies-and-gentlemen-the-rolling-stones/

Would magically energetic rocks look like this when moving?

Having seen many of the prior theories, I offered the following explanation on April 1, 2010:
"Their secret... an internal power source!  They glow as they move.  Who knew?"

My April Fools Day theory didn't gain much traction. It was fun to illustrate though!

Fortunately there were some much more serious people working on the case, so on December 21, 2013, Richard and James Norris were present to see standing water frozen on the lake bed, and to see and hear the ice cracking as the ice started to melt, then wind blew the ice sheet with the rocks embedded.  You can read the full account in today's story in the +Los Angeles Times:

Mystery of how rocks move across Death Valley lake bed solved
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-rocks-move-death-valley-lake-bed-20140827-story.html

I had actually predicted that mode of movement after reading an article on the stones in +National Geographic seven years ago, as I mentioned in this comment on +Flickr:
"I don't believe that 700 pound rocks can move by wind alone; I think they need to be trapped in floating ice, melting along the shore, that far outweighs them and which also catches the wind. Even the heaviest rocks are inconsequential when a solid lake surface that weighs many tons starts shifting in the wind."

I didn't exactly run up there to photograph it... Ice, high winds, while access to the area may be limited, what's not to like about that?   There are some good reasons why no one has been there to see it!

Z truth is out there...

Now that the mystery is solved, will this end the pilgrimage of people wanting to see these rocks, now that the mystery is gone?  The National Park Service worries that the news may actually increase traffic.

Will the end to the mystery stop people from stealing the rocks, with the hope that they have magical powers?

Of course not.  The proposal that the rocks don't have magical powers could simply be a government cover-up, right?  The sale of tinfoil hats to Death Valley visitors will be greater than ever.

Update 7 pm:
Here's a video which includes a sequence showing a rock moving.  Jump forward to 2:58 if you want to go straight there:

Circling the Sierra Nevada: The Racetrack in Death Valley National Park

Racetrack Sunset, originally uploaded by Jeff Sullivan (just back from Yosemite).

The Racetrack is one of the most amazing places in Death Valley. Both dawn and dusk can be good, and I still want to return to get star trails. It gets very cold quickly at nightfall this time of year, no doubt even colder at dawn. It's high enough to easily get below freezing (that's apparently how the rocks move, embedded in thick floating ice). The drive out can be completed at a fast pace in about an hour on heavy washboard gravel from Ubehebe Crater (where the paved road ends), about 90 minutes from Scotty's Castle, but it may be wise to take up to 2 hours for that last 29 miles. The paved road from Scotty's Castle to Stovepipe Wells is another hour.

You can't camp near The Racetrack, but you may be able to find a turnout up near Teakettle Junction. With the sun setting behind nearby mountains by 4pm or so, arrive by 2 so you can walk a mile or so to the moving rocks (far Southwest corner of the playa) and find the rocks and shooting angles you'll want to catch as the light gets good.

If you have a GPS unit and may be out until sunset, mark your car position so you can find your way back after dark. There may be some water to get around near the parking lot as well. The playa is closed if it's wet and muddy; the visitor center (or a site like DesertUSA) may have details on recent conditions to spare you a long, fruitless drive.

I've punctured a tire on 50% of my visits to The Racetrack (and I've had off-road SUV tires disintegrate on other washboard roads), and the Park Service recommends 4WD, high clearance, two spares and plenty of survival supplies. I've lost 5 or 6 tires to gravel roads over the past 3 years. I've simply been lucky not to get two at once. I carry two cans of Fix-a-Flat in case a puncture is small enough, but it the failure is rarely that small or simple on those roads, and sometimes those cans have gone bad and don't work (carry 2 different brands), perhaps due to the occasional heat of desert travel conditions (particularly in your locked car at a trailhead, even when the outside conditions aren't that hot).

The road to the Racetrack was in relatively good shape when I visited at the beginning of December... still crappy with very deep washboad that rattles your vehicle at any speed, but the additional baseball-sized rocks that pummelled my SUV last year had been graded to the side. The road from Ubehebe Crater to Eureka Dunes was also in better shape than on past trips, though still an hour or more of punishing rattling, and still rated by the Park Service as poorly as the road out to the Racetrack. Road conditions can change dramatically with one storm, so who knows what they're like now.

I don't yet have dates nailed down to offer a Death Valley workshop this year, but if you're interested in going, contact me and we can probably work something out. At a minimum, I'd like to visit again in March when wildflowers will add color to the park's incredible landscapes. Most photography tours to Death Valley don't visit the Eureka Dunes or The Racetrack, arguably the two best sites in the park. I can't imagine visiting the park without them!

Fall Trip 2: Zion National Park to Death Valley

When you reach the "standard" dawn shooting spot in Zion National Park a little early, you might as well capture a star trail shot. If the moon is up as it was for this shot, you can capture color in the surrounding trees and landscape as well.

As the sun lights the surrounding peaks, a graduated neutral density filter can be useful, but additional software or darkroom postprocessing may be warranted.

With light reaching the bottom of the canyon so slowly in Zion, it is fairly straightforward to head up the valley and find places to catch the advancing light in reflections in the Virgin River. A late morning departure from Zion leaves enough time to reach Death Valley by sunset.

The vast salt plain near Devil's Golf Course is one good option for dusk shots.

If you're really ambitious you can continue on another couple of hours on rough dirt roads to reach The Racetrack. Many people destroy a tire or two on the trip (as I did twice in my last 2 weeks on dirt roads, including here). This shot is one exposure, catching a spotlight shining into the air, then shining it on me standing as it I were still holding the spotlight... done twice.

For this single exposure shot I simply walked backwards holding a flashlight, then stood still as a spotlight was briefly flashed on me.