When the massive lake covering a chunk of Utah slowly dried at the end of the last ice age, it concentrated minerals in its dwindling supply of water and left behind a glittering expanse of salt to the west of Salt Lake City. Geological Survey estimated that 55 million tons of salt disappeared from the crust, thinning it by one and a half feet.īut the precise cause of these changes to the salt remains mysterious: It could be a sign that, after millennia, the Bonneville Salt Flats have started deteriorating, but it could also simply reflect normal shifts in this ethereal environment. This isn’t the first time concerns have been raised about the salt flats thinning: Between 19, the U.S. “And I’ve seen the salt get bad, I’ve seen it get good … We had 20 years with no problems, and just in the past, I don’t know, three to five years it seems like it’s been getting bad again.” “I’ve been going to the salt since I was 3 years old,” says Bill Lattin, president of the Southern California Timing Association, which runs Speed Week. Land speed racers are worried that this could be the beginning of the end of races on the Bonneville Salt Flats. Torrential rains last year and late spring rains followed by cooler temperatures this year led to the cancellations. With long, thick stretches of salt to speed over, the flats draw drivers seeking to reach speeds of over 600 miles per hour (966 kilometers per hour). The annual Speed Week land races on the flats have been canceled for the second year in a row. Racers who want to drive as fast as they can across Utah’s Bonneville Salt Flats might have to wait until next year to slake their need for speed.
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