Grand Canyon Shuts All South Rim Lodging
Grand Canyon Shuts All South Rim Lodging
The News
Grand Canyon National Park has closed all overnight guest lodging on its South Rim for an indefinite period after deadly flash floods washed out the only pipeline that supplies water to the canyon's busiest side.
The park itself remains open. But hundreds of rooms are off the market for lack of water, and thousands of tourists — many holding reservations booked a year or more in advance — are scrambling to find beds elsewhere.
The flooding killed two people and left a third missing, according to the Associated Press.
What Is Closed
Shuttered South Rim accommodations include the El Tovar Hotel, Bright Angel Lodge, Maswik Lodge, and Yavapai Lodge and Trailer Village, park officials said. Phantom Ranch lodge and campground, at the bottom of the canyon, was hit directly by the floods and is also closed.
South Rim campgrounds remain open but without spigots. Bathroom faucets still work. Campfires are banned, because less water is available to fight a wildfire.
Restaurants and other food and beverage service at the South Rim are still operating, drawing on storage tanks that were filled by the cross-canyon pipe.
Timeline
A wildfire destroyed a historic lodge on the Grand Canyon's quieter North Rim, taking every room and cabin on that side of the canyon out of service for more than a year. There is still no date for replacing them.
A repair project costing more than $200 million was already well underway on the aging cross-canyon waterline, which had failed repeatedly in recent years as grit in the water scoured the aluminum pipe from the inside.
Flash floods tore through Bright Angel Canyon, killing two people and leaving one missing, and washing out the pipeline that feeds every shower, faucet and spigot on the South Rim. About 40% of the pipeline was damaged.
Michelle Allen of Olathe, Kansas, was told to check out the next morning, one night into a five-night stay. "We had to hurry up and make accommodations somewhere else," she told the AP. "Luckily we were able to do that."
Park officials still could not say how long the lodging closure would last.
Reactions
Christine Vogt, a consultant on sustainable tourism and outdoor recreation in the Western U.S., said the shutdown will hit beyond Arizona because many Grand Canyon visitors also travel to Las Vegas. "This will be catastrophic," she said, adding that the water shut-off could last weeks.
Megha Budruk, an Arizona State University associate professor who studies communities near public lands, said an extended lodging shutdown could hit hundreds of service jobs in and around the park and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars in local revenue.
Xanterra spokeswoman Stephanie Plieness said the priorities are reporting leaks, using reclaimed water for nondrinking uses, and running dishwashers and washing machines only when full or in eco mode. "And asking guests and staff to be mindful of things like handwashing length and running water," she said by email. "Actions like these across the South Rim are what's helping the available water reserves go as far as possible."
Tusayan Mayor Clarinda Vail, whose town sits just outside the park boundary, said: "We're just heartbroken about what has happened at Phantom Ranch." She added: "We are open. Full services in Tusayan."
What's Next
The storage tanks still hold weeks' worth of water, and conservation will be at least part of the plan to stretch it. How the tanks get refilled after that is an open question.
Tusayan, a tourism hub 15 minutes from the South Rim with 1,200 lodging rooms and its own well water, is absorbing displaced guests. South Rim operators including Delaware North, which runs the 350-room Yavapai Lodge, promised to rebook as many customers there as they can — but the town's five main hotels were filling up fast.
"We're going to have more coming, I guarantee you," said Steven Ayres, front desk supervisor at the Grand Canyon Plaza Hotel.
At Grand Canyon Camper Village in Tusayan, business had been "oddly slow" for the season, general manager Joan Marquez said, but showers and laundry rooms are now seeing a surge.
More
Some 2,000 year-round residents and millions of annual visitors depend on the 12.5-mile pipe, built down, across and back up the sheer canyon walls in the 1960s.
In 2024, the park drew close to 5 million tourists who spent almost $1 billion in the remote northern Arizona region, according to the National Park Service. That spending supported almost 9,000 jobs, which generated $400 million in labor income and $1.1 billion in economic output in nearby communities.
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