AZFAMILY | Flash flooding, heavy rain, and blowing dust

Unfortunately, Van Dyke says damage from wind is pretty common in the community.

The Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO) confirmed 83-year-old Bruce Ruben died while hiking the Sears Kay Ruins Trail in the Tonto National Forest.

The ultimate goal of this high-flow experiment is to move sand and sediment along the Colorado River. “The idea is to kind of mitigate that sand loss, and keep things close to the way they were before the dam,” said Bob Tusso, a U.S. Geological Survey hydrologist. Sandbars are important, according to the feds: they are places for people to camp, fish, and also protect important archaeological sites throughout the Grand Canyon and across the Colorado River. “In a general, larger picture, it’s a national park, and the way the river was before the dam came in has changed a lot,” Tusso said.

While forest thinning helps fight against damaging climate change effects, NAU Associate Professor Nick McKay says the warming trends of the last few centuries are still unprecedented.