What happened at Burning Man?
BURNING Man is a week-long, annual desert campout that focuses on community, art, self-expression, and self-reliance.
Chaos erupted at the 2023 event, causing many to wonder what went wrong.
What happened at Burning Man?
Weather can sometimes impact festivals, but no one could've possibly predicted the outcome of the 2023 Burning Man festival.
Torrential rain left tens of thousands of people stranded, battling mud and foot-deep puddles.
"You had to haul," Kristine Rae, an attendee and physical therapist from Idaho, recalled of the experience, via The New York Times.
"There were cars stuck halfway up their wheels.”
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While the conditions might've made the experience unbearable for some, other attendees found the bright side in all the mess.
"The rain provided an amazing opportunity to walk, to move more slowly, to connect with people who you may not have," Donovan McGrath, a yoga instructor from Los Angeles, told The Times.
"There were many silver linings.”
The 2023 event, which had already been postponed twice due to weather, had roughly 72,000 attendees, including celebrities like Diplo and Chris Rock, but nearly half of them left before it was over, The Times notes.
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Did someone die at Burning Man?
The harsh weather conditions made it difficult for vehicles to get in and out of Nevada's Black Rock Desert, including emergency personnel who were dispatched to the location after receiving a call about a man who was unresponsive.
CPR was administered on-site but by the time medical personnel had arrived at the scene the man, who was later identified as 32-year-old Leon Reece, had been declared dead by a doctor at the event.
At this time, the cause of Reece's death has not been released, but Pershing County Sheriff Sgt. Nathan Carmichael told the Reno Gazette Journal that it did not appear to be weather-related.
Will Burning Man continue next year?
As the events of Burning Man 2023 unfolded, organizers turned down held from the Nevada National Guard.
At the time, CEO Marian Goodell told NBC News that there was "no cause for panic."
"We’ve made it really clear that we do not see this as an evacuation situation," Goodell explained.
Details on the 2024 Burning Man event have yet to be released, but nothing has been issued stating that it won't happen.