Wait times to exit Burning Man drop after flooding left tens of thousands stranded

Wait times for tens of thousands of Burning Man partygoers trying to exit the mud-caked northern Nevada desert are beginning to decrease after flooded roads left them stranded there for days.

Event organizers said they started to let traffic flow out on the main road around 2 p.m. local time Monday — even as they urged attendees to delay their exit to help ease traffic. About two hours after the mass departure began, organizers estimated a wait of about five hours.

By Tuesday morning, wait times had dropped to between two and three hours, according to the official Burning Man account on the social network X, formerly known as Twitter.

The annual gathering, which launched on a San Francisco beach in 1986, attracts nearly 80,000 artists, musicians and activists for a weeklong mix of wilderness camping and avantgarde performances. The festival had been closed to vehicles after more than a half-inch of rain fell Friday, causing flooding and foot-deep mud.

The road closures came just before the first of two ceremonial fires signaling an end to the festival was scheduled to begin Saturday night. The event traditionally culminates with the burning of a large wooden effigy shaped like a man and a wood temple structure the final two nights, but the fires were postponed as authorities worked to reopen exit routes by the end of Labor Day weekend.

Organizers had also asked attendees not to walk out of the Black Rock Desert about 110 miles north of Reno during that time, as others had done throughout the weekend, including D J Diplo and comedian Chris Rock.

“The Man” was torched Monday night, while the temple was set to go up in flames 8 p.m. Tuesday.

The event began Aug. 27 and had been scheduled to end Monday morning, with attendees packing up and cleaning up after themselves.

“We are a little bit dirty and muddy, but spirits are high. The party still going,” said Scott London, a Southern California photographer, adding that the travel limitations offered “a view of Burning Man that a lot of us don’t get to see.”

Disruptions are part of the event’s recent history: Dust storms forced organizers to temporarily close entrances to the festival in 2018, and the event was twice canceled during the pandemic.

C. 2023 MAXAR TECHNOLOGIES VIA AP A satellite image shows traffic leaving the Burning Man festival Monday in the Black Rock Desert north of Reno, Nevada. Partygoers stranded for days at the festival by a storm began leaving Monday afternoon after muddy roads dried up enough for them to begin their exodus.