On the night of May 20, 2017, more than a million tons of rocks and dirt spilled over California's iconic Highway 1. The slide was so large it can be seen from space.
The slide covered roughly 530 m (0.3 miles) of the scenic route in 10 to 12 m (35 to 40 feet) of rubble, closing the highway for the forseeable future.
“This is a large slide preceded by smaller slides, which is not uncommon,” said Thomas Stanley, a geologist and researcher for NASA. “Much of the California coastline is prone to collapse, so it’s fortunate that this landslide happened in an unpopulated location.” In 2015, the Monterey County Environmental Resource Policy Department rated parts of the nearby coast as highly susceptible to landslides.
Images courtesy: NASA/Landsat 8 - OLI (April 20, May 22), ESA/Sentinel-2 (May 17)
Download high resolution images: April 20, May 17, May 22
Video courtesy CBS/Monterey County Sheriff's Office
Featured image credit: NASA/Landsat 8 - OLI
Register/become a supporter
Support us AD-FREE
Your support is crucial for our survival. It makes this project fully self-sustainable and keeps us independent and focused on the content we love to create and share.
Monthly subscription
Yearly subscription
You'll receive your ad-free account for 20x faster browsing experience, clean interface without any distractions, ability to post comments without prior editorial check, all our desktop and mobile applications (current and upcoming) ad-free and with the full set of features available, a direct line of communication and much more. See all options.
