More than 10,000 visitors have been ordered out of the nation's oldest national park, Yellowstone National Park officials say.
Parts of Yellowstone will remain closed for the rest of the year because of extensive flood damage, managers have said, with the oldest national park in the United States completely shuttered.
All the entrances to the park, which sits chiefly in Wyoming state and is home to the Old Faithful geyser, remained closed on Wednesday for a third consecutive day.
Roads have been washed out in the northern portion of the 9,000 sq km park after torrential rainfall and snowmelt sent months' worth of run-off into rivers in just a couple of days.
Images released by the National Park Service showed large sections of a paved road had been swept away by raging rivers.
Aerial reconnaissance revealed "major damage to multiple sections of the road" in the northern part of the park, the agency said in its latest assessment.
"Many sections of road in these areas are completely gone and will require substantial time and effort to reconstruct.
"The National Park Service will make every effort to repair these roads as soon as possible; however, it is probable that road sections in northern Yellowstone will not reopen this season."
READ MORE: Yellowstone flooding forces 10,000 to flee US national park
A house fell into Montana’s Yellowstone River in the US on June 13 as the area endured record flooding and rockslides.
— TRT World (@trtworld) June 15, 2022
Yellowstone National Park has since closed its doors for the first time in 34 years for officials to assess the damage pic.twitter.com/IIhnAAOx7S
Wild weather
Several communities on the north side of the park in Montana also experienced significant flooding, with bridges and roads washed out in Park County.
Montana Governor Greg Gianforte declared a statewide disaster on Tuesday "to help impacted communities get back on their feet as soon as possible," he said on Twitter.
A huge dome of high pressure is sitting over the United States, sending temperatures soaring for 120 million people.
Meteorologists say the edge of that dome, where the colder air meets warm air, is experiencing wild weather, including heavy rainfall.
Higher-than-usual temperatures have also caused the snowpack on the high mountains to melt, adding to the influx of water into rivers.
Yellowstone Park, which welcomed more than 4.8 million visitors last year, is America's oldest national park.
The park was the inspiration for Jellystone Park in the 1960s cartoon "Yogi Bear."
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