It's Time to Rethink Burning Man

The climate crisis makes its presence known at the massive annual arts festival.

By Kimberley Mok

TREE HUGGER
Published September 8, 2023

Attendees gather to watch the burning of "The Chapel of Babel" during the Burning Man Festival in the early morning of September 5, 2023. 

AFP via Getty Images / Getty Images

The proverbial dust settled earlier this week after attendees at the annual Burning Man festival were finally given the green light to leave after torrential rains turned the event grounds into a muddy quagmire that prevented tens of thousands of people from driving out. Festival goers were told to conserve food and water until the ground dried sufficiently for cars, trucks, and RVs to drive on.

For some, this round of uncooperative weather may remain only an unfortunate footnote in the storied history of this increasingly popular arts and music festival, which has been happening since the 1980s. But for others, it's a jarring wake-up call that such massive events are not exempt from the harsh realities of global warming, which makes such extreme meteorological events all the more intense and more frequent. If anything, it may be time to rethink large events such as Burning Man, which attracted more than 70,000 people this year alone.

Truly Leaving No Trace?

Attendees known as "burners" strike down their Unicorner camp before new rainfalls in a muddy desert plain on September 3, 2023. AFP via Getty Images / Getty Images

Many are drawn to the festival for its various music events and its mind-blowing art installations, which often dot the surreal landscape in this slice of the Nevada desert, known colloquially as "the playa."

Guided by Burning Man's tenets of radical self-expression, self-reliance, and inclusion, literally almost anything goes in this week-long festival where no money is supposed to change hands, and a culture of gifting and community-building is cultivated.

One of Burning Man's most well-known principles is to "leave no trace," where partygoers are encouraged to meticulously pick up every bit of debris and "matter [that is] out of place" in order to leave the site in a better state than it was found.

However, the gap between Burning Man's ideals and its reality can be quite large. Despite attendees' efforts to leave no trace on the site itself, local residents in the nearest town of Reno, Nevada, have spoken out about how their town has become a dumping ground for discarded items after the event. The event could arguably contribute to overconsumption, as SFGATE reports:

"Public works has seen 'everything from coolers and bicycles to RVs' dumped in Reno after Burning Man. [Bryan Heller, the assistant director of Reno Public Works] estimates about half-a-dozen camping vehicles get ditched each year in the city. His guys sometimes pick up enough garbage to fill six 30-yard dumpsters. That's about 400 curbside garbage bins of trash."

A Complex Ecosystem Under Strain

Satellite image of some of the camps of the 70,000 festival attendees in 2017. DigitalGlobe via Getty Images / Getty Images

Then, there are the scientists who say that the site's delicate ecosystem is put under immense strain each year as tens of thousands of festival-goers converge on the 4,000-acre site to set up their camps and installations.

Though the otherworldly pale sands of the playa may seem like they don't support much life, it's actually an ancient, dried lakebed that reawakens under rain, as Patrick Donnelly, Nevada's state director of the Center for Biological Diversity, pointed out a few years back:

"Burners may mistake the playa for nothing but acres of dust. But playas are ecosystems that sustain a variety of species. Each year when the snowmelt floods onto the Black Rock, tiny communities of macroinvertebrates like fairy shrimp and brine fleas come to life. In a beautiful example of co-evolution, the timing of this hatch coincides with the arrival of migratory birds, who feast on these bugs on their journey north. [..]

"Playas are also complex hydrologic systems, draining and evaporating water based on small changes in topography and the alkali composition of the desert soil. Over time vehicular and foot traffic has changed the hydrology of the Black Rock. [..] Burning Man needs to take more responsibility for the damage it’s done to the environment and accept that it may have already reached the natural limits imposed by the Black Rock Desert Playa and its rural surroundings."

Climate Clash

Vehicles line up to leave the site of the annual Burning Man Festival on September 5, 2023. AFP via Getty Images / Getty Images

It would seem that Donnelly's views aren't unique; in fact, during the festival's opening last week, a coalition of climate organizations—including one founded by concerned members of the Burning Man community—blocked traffic temporarily from entering the festival grounds.

The short-lived protest was an attempt to draw attention to the fact that the event produces about 100,000 tons of CO2 a year—90% of that coming from travel as people drive and fly from all over the country and internationally to reach the festival.

Rising temperatures over the last few years have translated to more air-conditioned domes on the playa that operate on fossil fuels. Burning Man even has its own airstrip catering to private jets and helicopters. During that one week, the event ostensibly becomes Nevada's third-largest city, nicknamed Black Rock City. Though Burning Man has implemented various initiatives to make the festival greener, some protesters like Will Livernois of Scientist Rebellion are pointing out that it's simply not enough:

“The climate movement has reached a point where there is a split between climate mitigation through technological fixes, and climate justice that’s more oriented around systemic inequalities. We have to shift away from Burning Man’s green capitalism and focus on degrowth.”

Gentrification in a Microcosm

Indeed, some of those systemic inequalities are playing themselves out in how the festival has been "gentrified" in some ways by Silicon Valley's elite, as those who can afford to travel there on their private jets also exploit the labor of less-wealthy attendees to set up and maintain lavish and exclusive "plug-and-play" camps. As writer Keith A. Spencer eloquently laments in "Why The Rich Love Burning Man," this gentrifying microcosm sadly reflects the macrocosm outside the boundaries of this temporary festival:

"In a just, democratic society, everyone has equal voice. At Burning Man everyone is invited to participate, but the people who have the most money decide what kind of society Burning Man will be—they commission artists of their choice and build to their own whims. They also determine how generous they are feeling, and whether to withhold money.

"It might seem silly to quibble over the lack of democracy in the 'governance' of Black Rock City. After all, why should we care whether Jeff Bezos has commissioned a giant metal unicorn or a giant metal pirate ship, or whether [venture capitalist Jim] Tananbaum wants to spend $2 million on an air-conditioned camp? But the principles of these tech scions—that societies are created through charity, and that the true 'world-builders' are the rich and privileged—don’t just play out in the Burning Man fantasy world. They carry over into the real world, often with less-than-positive results."

Burning Man as a phenomenon has clearly reached a crossroads, brought on by the constraints of a finite planet and an increasingly unequal society. Given the fragility of the site's ecosystem and the very real environmental impacts that it imposes year after year, it might be time for organizers and community members to rethink how the festival continues going forward. Might Burning Man ban private jets, single-use plastics, and further commodification? Or perhaps it could also shift toward a bi-annual timing like some massive festivals have already done to lessen their carbon footprint? Perhaps it could also transition to a primarily decentralized model that features more regional "burns"—local Burning Man-inspired events that already happen year-round?

Whatever it may be, radical change needs to happen. Of course, we as a society will always need more art, beauty, and inspirational experiences in the world. At its most idealistic, Burning Man represents all those and more. But ultimately, those ideals have to be rooted in reality—and right now, that increasingly dire reality requires an urgent response.

Essay

Will the Rains Extinguish Burning Man?

The desert festival thrives on unpredictability, but a changing climate may be a bridge too far.

By Matthew Hutson

NEW YORKER

September 8, 2023

Attendees hold bottles containing urine at Burning Man, in Black Rock City, on September 2nd.Photographs by Sinna Nasseri

Last Thursday was a typically atypical day at Burning Man—the last before a series of atypically atypical days. It began, for me, with a bike ride with some friends to the Temple for an orchestral performance. Burning Man is named after a large effigy that burns in a raucous extravaganza on Saturday night; the next night, most of the same crowd sits in silence watching a wooden temple, of a different design each year, go up in flames. Beforehand, people fill the Temple with messages, writing on the walls and stapling photos and personal effects to the structure. I wandered inside and perused the community’s contributions. Many of them memorialized lost loved ones, but the ones that hit me hardest addressed the search for self-love. “To my past self,” one message read. “You are more amazing than you realize. We’ve made it.” The note ended with a hint at the future: “See you there. xoxo.”

I was in a receptive mood, and tears streamed down my face. I spent an hour reading. Then I headed to Burning Man’s makeshift airport, where I needed to reschedule a volunteer shift. The airport is a somewhat contentious spot: earlier in the week, climate protesters had blocked off the road leading to Burning Man to protest, among other things, the increasing number of private planes flying into the temporary metropolis that we call Black Rock City. For years, the community has struggled with how to deal with the influx of money. Wealthy individuals contribute to some stunning art, mutant vehicles, and theme camps on the playa, but the cash also allows people to insulate themselves in R.V.s set up by hired hands. In an official newsletter, the Burning Man Project reported that they “took action” last year against seventy camps for selling accommodations, amenities, or services. “Convenience camping (formerly described as turnkey or plug-and-play camping) is not permitted in BRC, and runs totally counter to the values of our community,” its Web site reads. Burning Man is supposed to be hard.

As I headed back to camp from the airport, I passed a photographer who’d set up a white tent to take portraits of Burners. I stopped in for one. Then I ran into a friend from New York who helps run Kostume Kult, a theme camp that gives away flamboyant garb and hosts parties and runway shows for anyone who wants to strut. We played Jenga, accepted Capri Sun bags injected with alcohol, and filmed people for a sing-along video that he’s making with his wife. Back at my own camp, Deep Playa Surprise, I was recruited for a bike ride back across the city to visit a foam body-wash party. We arrived too late and settled for shaved ice handed out by kids. Just as I started back, a dust storm rolled in. Blinded in the whiteout, I navigated by following the sound of a distant beat. It was the kind of extreme weather that’s predictably unpredictable at Burning Man: you learn to not leave camp without goggles and a dust mask.

I made it back in time to see that the camp across the street from us, run by a bunch of Aussies, was about to begin its Dildo Olympics. I joined a team, and then our own event for that day followed. We served cocktails and hosted a discussion with NiNo Alicea, the first Puerto Rican artist to earn a grant from Burning Man; his work this year, “ATABEY’s Treasure,” was a silver fish whose head and tail appeared to peek from below the desert ground to a height of about twenty feet. (Burning Man is glacially becoming more racially diverse, but it’s still heavily populated by wealthy, college-educated white people.) We rode out to the sculpture, where a couple who looked like Instagram influencers were photographing each other; an apparently professional ballet dancer soon arrived, and began posing and leaping around in a thong for another photographer. We returned to camp, where two friends on their way to No Holes Barred, a comedy club down the block, told us that they’d just got engaged. Earlier that week, one of them had run a desert ultramarathon on acid.

Black Rock City is shaped like a doughnut with a bite taken out of it: the Man is in the center of the hole, the Temple is in the bite mark, and art fills the hole, the bite, and the space beyond for about a mile. After dark, a group of us biked out to see the glowing art scattered around the playa. In a large piece made by my friend from Kostume Kult and his wife, four stacked rings, each about five feet high, rotated on an axis; by pulling on the rings with ropes, people could mix and match animal legs, bodies, heads, and ears. We watched a two-story heart-shaped chrysalis burn, revealing a steel butterfly inside. Farther out, we found a miniature airstrip with rocking chairs shaped like airplanes; we climbed up a tower—a plane pointed vertically with a lower level containing a lounge and open bar serving tea. (All bars at Burning Man are open bars.) I often think that Black Rock City has some of the best contemporary art in the world, from big installations like the temples to little pieces of mind-fuckery, like a lone mirror, set up on its own, that read, “Don’t look high.”



After a few hours of touring art, we headed to a dance party at a camp called Ashram Galactica. I ran into a friend who was building a retreat in Costa Rica. Then we rode back to camp through a nighttime dust storm.




The next day, Friday, was cold for Burning Man. In the late morning, a few of us went to a camp called Bubbles and Bass for champagne and house music. Then, in the early afternoon, it started raining. That would be the last of Burning Man as we knew it. The rain grew heavier, and our camp of about twenty hunkered down in our tents and R.V.s. I didn’t make it to my rescheduled airport shift—I saw someone try and fail to ride a bike in the mud, and figured that, even if I could make it to the airport on foot, nothing would be landing anyway. Eventually, most of us gathered in one large R.V. for the evening. Just walking the few dozen feet from my tent was treacherous. Water turns the playa dust into a clay-like mud; every step adds another layer of muck to your shoes, and after just a few steps your encased feet are pounds heavier. We drank, snacked, and laughed until bedtime. Then we used pull-string kitchen trash bags, one for each foot, to make it back to our tents, waddling along as we held them up by the strings. In my tent—which, after years of use, was no longer waterproof—pools of muddy water were collecting. I carpeted the floor with emergency rain ponchos, piled things on top, and tried to sleep in my half-soaked sleeping bag.

On Saturday morning, we surveyed the situation. Mud and pools of water surrounded us. Some people had planned to leave that day, to avoid a lengthy exodus—it can take hours to channel tens of thousands of people out of the desert and onto the narrow two lanes of Highway 447—but now it would be impossible. We listened on the radio to predictions of further showers. There would be no sun until Monday, and it could take a day or more of sunlight for the ground to dry; we realized that we might not get out until Wednesday.


We ate and drank, but not too much—we had plenty to go around, but wanted to avoid the porta-potties. Getting to them now involved navigating a slippery, stumbly, sticky obstacle course; the muck in the much-trod area in front of them was especially deep, and, inside, mud was building up on the floor, requiring a big, risky step up. (On the other hand, the extra height turned them into Squatty Potties—good for gut evacuation!) Because service trucks couldn’t reach the porta-potties, they started to fill up. We peed in jugs in our tents and contemplated shitting in bags. This was the approach people had taken during Renegade Burn, in 2021, when there was no official Burn because of the pandemic but thousands came to the playa anyway.


VIDEO FROM THE NEW YORKER

Your Body vs. Extreme Heat


In late August, a week before the festival, an even heavier rain had hit, from Tropical Storm Hilary, flooding much of the desert for days. (A photo of someone in a kayak circulated online.) I’d met a festival worker who told me that the best way to walk around then had been in socks—over either feet or shoes—and I shared this information with my campmates. We tried various combinations of socks, shoes, and trash bags. Meanwhile, some people got intermittent wireless or cellular signals. Texts arrived from friends asking if we were O.K., and we began to see ourselves in the news. The view from the outside didn’t align with the view from the inside. We were mostly just inconvenienced, enjoying one another’s company and half joking about “trauma bonding,” but news reports described it as a “disaster,” perhaps putting some people in mind of Hurricane Katrina or the Maui fires. On one site, we found a rumor about an Ebola outbreak, which we quickly dismissed; elsewhere we read that Chris Rock and Diplo had hiked through miles of mud to the pavement and, alarmingly, that someone had been electrocuted while trying to start a generator in standing water. (He may have died of drug intoxication, a coroner later said.)

In fact, everything did not go to hell. People supported one another, sharing resources within and between camps. We offered beer to our neighbors and received ice cream. One good Samaritan with a rainbow parasol hat carried a shovel to the porta-potties and started to clean out the mud. Later, I saw online that some people had made mud sculptures—a dragon, a phallus (naturally). The few bad vibes were cast at people who tried to drive out of Black Rock City even though we were being told to shelter in place. All the attempts I saw failed, as vehicles got stuck and spun their wheels, blocking and damaging the road. Maybe those people really needed to be somewhere else; maybe they just wanted to be somewhere else. I don’t know, and can’t judge them.




This was my eighth time at Burning Man, but my first in seven years. I’d stopped going because of the stress, the hassle, and the opportunity cost: at least a week offline, perhaps another week of travel and errands in Reno and elsewhere, and sometimes months of preparation. Once I get to the playa, I feel at home—more myself than anywhere else—but until that moment I’m racked with anxiety, thinking about every little thing that can go wrong, from faux pas to equipment failure to grievous injury. (During my second year, a toppling speaker broke my friend Suzie’s arm and she courageously stayed at the Burn in a sling all week before having surgery back in New York.) Going to Burning Man is a leap of faith—a bet that you can just deal.

In my early years, I did more psychedelics—LSD, psilocybin, MDMA, MDA, 2C-B, DOM—each trip also a leap of faith. My last few psychedelic trips at Burning Man, however, I felt overwhelmed and retreated to my tent to be with my own thoughts. I began sticking mostly to alcohol. This year, I decided to test myself again. Sitting around with my campmates in the muck on Saturday, I took half a tab of AL-LAD, a chemical analogue of LSD. The initial rush created a familiar anxiety—the kind that a high person feels when staring into a mirror that says, “Don’t look high.” I questioned the appropriateness of everything I did, and of core parts of myself. Then I reflected on the messages in the Temple about seeking self-love. Everyone questions themselves. We are all flawed, and it eats at us, yet we find ways to deal, hopefully.

I assigned myself the task of accepting what I could not control—the weather, the porta-potties, parts of who I was. Through all this, I was actually having a pretty good time. One laughter attack with a campmate—the kind that feeds on itself—left us gasping and teary-eyed. Someone kept shouting “Best Burn ever!” at passersby. Maybe it was. In a way, the wetness had disrupted the festival, but it had also reified it as a time and place for disruption. I thought back to my first Burn, in 2007. When I arrived, after midnight on Tuesday morning, the Man was already on fire; an old-school Burner had ignited it in apparent protest of what he later said had become an R.V.-filled “Alterna-Disney,” hoping to bring the festival back to its countercultural roots. Maybe the rains would be another sort of jolt. Or maybe they would lead to more R.V.s.

Because of the rain, the Man would not burn on Saturday night. But the Aussies set up a small wooden man in the middle of the street, doused it in gasoline, and lit it up. Every year, there’s a fire conclave—a collection of fire dancers invited to perform around the Man before it goes up in flames. During my last Burn, in 2016, I was part of the conclave, spinning poi. Seeing the mini-man, I grabbed my L.E.D. poi and jammed out, feeling sorry for everyone whose performances and events had been cancelled. The Aussies followed their burn with a dance party that went until eight in the morning. By then, it was still cool and cloudy, but the wind had dried the mud enough for us to start taking down our shade structure and kitchen and begin packing things up. Service trucks reached the porta-potties. People marched over carrying gallon-size water jugs filled with pee that was dark amber from tactical dehydration.

The weather was iffy, with sun and clouds here and there. Two people in our camp made it out in a truck; two others started driving, got caught in a shower, and trudged back to camp on foot. The new rain meant that no one else would be getting out that day. But Monday was sunny, and we all managed to pack up, scour the ground for moop (matter out of place), and leave, along with much of the rest of Black Rock City. It took eight hours of stop-and-go traffic to drive the few miles to the pavement—not the shortest exodus, not the longest. I think they burned the Man as I was on the road to Reno.




Last year, Burning Man was exceptionally hot and dusty. Those conditions persuaded many people not to return this year. But last week, we yearned for the heat and the dust. When people ask me whether the event has changed much since I started going, I say it hasn’t. It’s grown bigger; bars now ask for I.D.; Instagram wasn’t a thing before. But those changes are minor. Climate change could be an existential risk. If it gets too hot on the playa, some people will die, and many more will stop coming; if heavier rain falls, a fema situation could unfold. Logistically, financially, ethically, That Thing in the Desert might become untenable. From Reno, I reached out to the Burning Man Project to ask whether they’ll be planning things differently next year. A spokesperson later wrote that “it would be too soon to know if anything next year might need to change.”

As those road-blockaders saw, Burning Man is not only a victim of environmental change but also a perpetrator of it. A friend—the one engaged to the ultramarathoner—recently described the festival as “the ultimate expression of a capitalist economy that throws off so much surplus wealth” that “tens of thousands of people can gather to create self-destructing artifacts.” In 2019, when the Burning Man Project last sought to renew its permit with the Bureau of Land Management, it faced environmental-impact requirements that it argued “would forever negatively change the fabric of the Burning Man event, if not outright kill it.” (At least some of the requirements were dropped, and the permit was renewed.)

But there are many kinds of adaptation. Larry Harvey, Burning Man’s late founder, once said that the festival would be over when it was everywhere else—that is, when its ethos had become the Zeitgeist. Burning Man’s ten principles—radical inclusion, gifting, decommodification, radical self-reliance, radical self-expression, communal effort, civic responsibility, leaving no trace, participation, and immediacy—are not exclusive to a late-August party in Nevada capped by ritual conflagrations. They can take myriad forms. Humanity may face a climate apocalypse, or another kind of apocalypse, and selfishness and resentment and bad vibes will surely emerge, but so will generosity, practicality, and good vibes. Waiting for the shuttle to the Reno airport on Tuesday, I asked a woman from Montreal about her Burn. She’d also seen someone shovelling mud out of the porta-potties; other people noticed what was happening and grabbed their own shovels. “The news said we’d become like ‘Lord of the Flies,’ ” she told me. “But we’re not animals. This is what we do.” ♦







Matthew Hutson is a contributing writer at The New Yorker covering science and technology.

 

How Burning Man got stuck in the mud- 

CBC News · Posted: Sep 08, 2023

 

Earthquake in Morocco 

Death Toll Surpasses 2,000 From Strong Quake in Morocco

Rescuers were searching for survivors of a powerful earthquake that struck overnight about 50 miles from the city of Marrakesh.

Sept. 9, 2023

Marrakesh, Morocco

Reuters

Constant Méheut, Vivian Yee, Aida Alami and Mike Ives

Here is the latest on the deadly earthquake.

Search and rescue efforts were intensifying on Saturday night, nearly 24 hours after a powerful and deadly earthquake surged across western Morocco, as emergency teams raced to prevent more deaths in remote mountain villages that are not easily accessible.

The quake, which struck in the High Atlas Mountains shortly after 11 p.m. on Friday, has killed more than 2,000 people and raised the specter of a humanitarian disaster in a seismically vulnerable area of Africa.

The office of King Mohammed VI said that he had ordered the government to rapidly provide shelter and rebuild houses for those in distress, “particularly orphans and the vulnerable,” but that certain areas were inaccessible during darkness, preventing rescue workers from reaching them until after dawn on Sunday. The king also did not clarify whether Morocco would formally request foreign assistance to allow outside rescue teams to intervene.

At least 2,012 people were killed, according to Morocco’s Interior Ministry, and at least 2,059 were injured, more than 1,400 of them critically. The quake, which had a magnitude of at least 6.8 according to a preliminary report from the United States Geological Survey, was the strongest to hit the area in more than a century.

“I never felt anything like this in my life,” said Raja Bouri, 33, who lives in the outskirts of Marrakesh. “It felt like a plane fell on me..”

The temblor was indiscriminate in its demolition, rippling through the densely populated medinas of Marrakesh and the rural villages ringing the city, where walls of earthen homes shook, cracked and collapsed. Some roads have been blocked by landslides, said Sami Fakhouri, the acting head in Morocco of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.

Local news media posted images of rubble-strewn streets and footage of people panicking as the shaking began. Some residents returned to their apartments after the quake ended, but many others in areas near the quake’s epicenter, fearful of aftershocks, spent the night sleeping on the streets.

“My husband and four children died,” one woman told Moroccan state television. “Mustapha, Hassan, Ilhem, Ghizlaine, Ilyes. Everything I had is gone. I am all alone.”

Here’s what to know about the earthquake:

• France, a former colonial power in Morocco, was among the first to offer help. The French Embassy in Morocco opened a crisis hotline and the mayor of the southern French port city of Marseille said that he would send firefighters to help with rescue efforts in Marrakesh, a sister city.

• Moroccan authorities announced three days of national mourning to honor victims of the deadly earthquake. In a statement carried by the state news agency, the office of King Mohammed VI said that after a crisis meeting with officials in Rabat, the capital, he had ordered the government to rapidly provide shelter and rebuild houses for those in distress, “particularly orphans and the vulnerable.”

• Several governments and charity groups, including Doctors Without Borders, have offered to send aid and rescue teams. Even countries with a history of conflicted relations with Morocco — like Israel and Algeria — have pledged to provide assistance. Here’s how to help.

• Marrakesh is known for its old city, a UNESCO World Heritage Site that was founded in the 11th century and which attracts tourists with its open-air markets, uneven cobblestone streets and labyrinthine passageways.

• The precise strength of the quake was not yet fully clear. The U.S. Geological Survey estimated it at 6.8. But a Moroccan agency said it measured 7.2., which the U.S.G.S. said could be more accurate. Initial readings of magnitude are measured automatically, and need to be revised by seismologists.

Natasha Frost, Aurelien Breeden and Maya Wei-Haas contributed reporting.

Sept. 9, 2023, 6:06 p.m. ETSept. 9, 2023

Sept. 9, 2023

Aida Alami

reporting from Marrakesh, Morocco

The death toll from the earthquake has reached at least 2,012 people, according to Morocco’s Interior Ministry late Saturday night.

READ ON 

Earthquake in Morocco: Death Toll Surpasses 2,000 From Strong Quake in Morocco - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

Photos: Scenes From Morocco’s Deadly Magnitude-6.8 Earthquake - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

More than 2,000 killed in Morocco's most powerful earthquake in a century

Historic buildings damaged from Atlas Mountains to Marrakech

The Associated Press · Posted: Sep 08, 2023

A rare, powerful earthquake that struck Morocco toppled buildings in mountainous villages and ancient cities not built to withstand such force. More than 2,000 people were killed, and the toll is expected to rise as rescuers struggled Saturday to reach hard-hit remote areas.

The 6.8-magnitude quake, the biggest to hit the North African country in 120 years, sent people fleeing their homes in terror and disbelief late Friday.

One man said dishes and wall hangings began raining down, and people were knocked off their feet. The quake brought down walls made from stone and masonry, covering whole communities with rubble.

WATCH | Inside the town of Amizmiz after the quake

A 6.8-magnitude earthquake in Morocco killed more than 2,000 people and caused significant damage in Morocco — including in Amizmiz, a town south of Marrakech located near the epicentre of the quake.

 

The devastation gripped each town along the steep and winding switchbacks of the High Atlas in similar ways: homes folding in on themselves and mothers and fathers crying as boys and helmet-clad police carried the dead through the streets.

Remote villages like those in the drought-stricken Ouargane Valley were largely cut off from the world when they lost electricity and cellphone service. By midday, people were outside mourning neighbours, surveying the damage on their camera phones and telling one another "May God save us."



A family sits outside their home after an earthquake in Moulay Brahim village, near Marrakech, Morocco, on Saturday. A rare, powerful earthquake struck Morocco late Friday night, killing more than 2,000 people and damaging buildings from villages in the Atlas Mountains to the historic city of Marrakech. 

(Mosa'ab Elshamy/The Associated Press)

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Hamid Idsalah, a 72-year-old mountain guide, said he and many others remained alive but had little future to look forward to. That was true in the short-term — with remnants of his kitchen reduced to dust — and in the long-term — where he and many others lack the financial means to rebound.

"I can't reconstruct my home. I don't know what I'll do. Still, I'm alive, so I'll wait," he said as he walked through the desert oasis town overlooking red rock hills, packs of goats and a glistening salt lake. "I feel heartsick."

Famed mosque damaged

In historic Marrakech, people could be seen on state TV clustering in the streets, afraid to go back inside buildings that might still be unstable.

The city's famous Koutoubia Mosque, built in the 12th century, sustained damage, but the extent was not immediately clear. Its 69-metre minaret is known as the "roof of Marrakech."

Moroccans also posted videos showing damage to parts of the famous red walls that surround the old city, a UNESCO World Heritage site.

A woman and her daughter stand outside their home in the town of Moulay Brahim, near Marrakech, Morocco, on Saturday, a day after a powerful earthquake struck the area. (Mosa'ab Elshamy/The Associated Press)

At least 2,012 people died, mostly in Marrakech and five provinces near the quake's epicentre, Morocco's Interior Ministry reported Saturday evening. Another 2,059 people were injured — 1,404 critically — the ministry said.

"The problem is that where destructive earthquakes are rare, buildings are simply not constructed robustly enough to cope with strong ground shaking, so many collapse, resulting in high casualties," said Bill McGuire, professor emeritus of geophysical and climate hazards at University College London.

About a dozen Canadians attending a UNESCO conference in Marrakech are safe, according to John Norman, the mayor of Bonavista, N.L. He was awoken in his hotel room Friday night.

"I think everyone is in a bit of shock," Norman, who is also the chair of the Discovery UNESCO Global Geopark on the Bonavista Peninsula, told CBC News.

Canada's foreign affairs minister, Mélanie Joly, urged Canadians in Morocco to register with Global Affairs Canada. She said Canadians there who need help should contact the federal Emergency Watch and Response Centre, which can provide emergency consular assistance.

Marrakech resident Amanda Mouttaki was talking to family members living outside the country when the earthquake hit on Friday. She initially thought a plane might be coming down, as she and her husband live near the airport.

"Things started falling off the walls," Mouttaki, who is originally from Michigan, told CBC News Network on Saturday.

She and her husband quickly grabbed their five-year-old son and fled into the street. "Everybody was on the streets, just crying and trying to figure out what happened," she said.

WATCH | Marrakech resident describes earthquake:

'Things started falling off the walls,' Marrakech resident says about earthquake

Duration1:38

Amanda Mouttaki, who lives in the newer part of Marrakech, describes what happened when a 6.8-magnitude earthquake shook the Moroccan city.

In a sign of the huge scale of the disaster, Morocco's King Mohammed VI ordered the armed forces to mobilize specialized search-and-rescue teams and a surgical field hospital, according to a statement from the military.

The king said he would visit the hardest-hit area on Saturday, but despite an outpouring of offers of help from around the world, the Moroccan government had not formally asked for assistance — a step required before outside rescue crews could deploy.

A man stands next to a damaged hotel after the earthquake in Moulay Brahim, near the epicentre of the earthquake outside Marrakech, on Saturday. 

(Mosa'ab Elshamy/The Associated Press)

The epicentre of Friday's tremor was near the town of Ighil in Al Haouz Province, roughly 70 kilometres south of Marrakech. Al Haouz is known for scenic villages and valleys tucked in the High Atlas.

Police, emergency vehicles and people fleeing in shared taxis spent hours traversing unpaved roads through the High Atlas in a stop-and-go manner, often exiting their cars to help clear giant boulders from routes known to be rugged and difficult long before Friday's earthquake.

Newfoundlanders in Morocco safe but in 'shock' after powerful earthquake strikes historic city

In Ijjoukak, a village in the area surrounding Toubkal, North Africa's tallest peak, residents estimated nearly 200 buildings had been levelled.

Couch cushions, electric cords and grapes were strewn in giant piles of rubble alongside dead sheep, house plants and leaning doors wedged between boulders. Relatives from the town and those who had driven from major cities cried while they wondered who to call as they reckoned with the aftermath and a lack of food and water.

Security forces take part in a rescue operation after the earthquake in Moulay Brahim, on Saturday. (Mosa'ab Elshamy/The Associated Press)

"It felt like a bomb went off," 34-year-old Mohamed Messi said.

Morocco will observe three days of national mourning with flags at half-mast on all public facilities, the official news agency MAP reported.
World offers help

World leaders offered to send aid or rescue crews as condolences poured in from the G20 summit in India, countries around Europe, the Mideast and beyond.

Turkey, where powerful earthquakes in February killed more than 50,000 people, said it was ready to provide support. France and Germany, with large populations of people of Moroccan origin, also offered to help.

In an exceptional move, neighbouring Algeria offered to open its airspace to allow eventual humanitarian aid or medical evacuation flights to travel to and from Morocco.

Algeria closed the airspace when its government severed diplomatic ties with Morocco in 2021 over a series of issues. The countries have a decades-long dispute involving the territory of Western Sahara.

Moroccan Red Crescent workers help remove large stones that fell on roads during the earthquake on their way to affected villages in the Middle Atlas mountain near Marrakech on Saturday. (Mosa'ab Elshamy/The Associated Press)

The U.S. Geological Survey said the quake had a preliminary magnitude of 6.8 when it hit at 11:11 p.m. local time, with shaking that lasted several seconds.

The U.S. agency reported that a 4.9-magnitude aftershock hit 19 minutes later. The collision of the African and Eurasian tectonic plates occurred at a relatively shallow depth, which makes a quake more dangerous.

Earthquakes are relatively rare in North Africa. Lahcen Mhanni, head of the Seismic Monitoring and Warning Department at the National Institute of Geophysics, told 2M TV that the earthquake was the strongest ever recorded in the region.

In 1960, a 5.8-magnitude tremor struck near the Moroccan city of Agadir, causing thousands of deaths. That quake prompted changes in construction rules in Morocco, but many buildings — especially rural homes — are not built to withstand such tremors.

In 2004, a 6.4-magnitude earthquake near the Mediterranean coastal city of Al Hoceima left more than 600 dead.

Friday's quake was felt as far away as Portugal and Algeria.

A resident navigates through the rubble in Marrakech on Friday. 

(Fadel Senna/AFP/Getty Images)


With files from Jessica Singer, CBC News, The Canadian Press and REUTERS

‘A dark Saturday’: Montreal’s Moroccan community in shock after tragic earthquake

By Mitchell Bailey 

 Global News
Updated September 9, 2023 

WATCH ABOVE: On Saturday, many Moroccans living in Montreal gathered in a nearby cafe to get updates from their country's local news as the death toll from a powerful earthquake that struck their home country on Friday night continued to rise. As Gloria Henriquez reports, a resident with family in Morocco is hoping the nightmare back home ends soon.

Montreal is home to Canada’s largest Moroccan population and on Saturday, many community members awoke to the tragic news that the country’s central region was struck overnight by its largest recorded earthquake in over a century.

Recent reports from Morocco’s interior minister indicate that the death toll has now reached 1,037, as reported by the BBC. The epicentre of the 6.8 magnitude quake was in the country’s High Atlas Mountains region, which is about 71km southwest of the popular tourism destination of Marrakech.

On an average weekend morning, the La Amistad coffee shop in Montreal would be playing soccer games, but on Saturday it was all about the news.

“It’s a dark Saturday,” said Mouslih Yassine, a Moroccan Montrealer who works at the shop.

He said the earthquake is all his clients are talking about

Outside of the La Amistad café in Montreal on Saturday, where groups of Moroccan Montrealers gathered to receive updates from local news channels as a 6.8 magnitude earthquake has taken the lives of hundreds in their home country. 

Gloria Henriquez

“Since last night at 7 p.m., everyone is talking about those who are injured, those who died. It really is sad, we simply tried to call all our family members yesterday to see if they are healthy and okay,” he said.

Yassine’s family is in Casablanca, the largest city in the North African country, where the impacts of the earthquake were also felt. He said that after the earthquake, his family slept on the street for fear of a second one.

“They were shocked, it was surprising to them,” Yassine said. “We’re hoping it stops here. We really are hoping.”

The convulsions were felt all the way into the capital city of Rabat, which is located about 350 kilometres north of the epicentre.

Noureddene Mosbah, who has family in Marrakech, said some people woke up with “nothing” in the impacted areas.

“They have no help,” Mosbah said, “It’s very, very terrible.”

He says his friend told him on the phone this morning that he doesn’t have water or food.

The majority of victims are believed to be in remote villages near the mountainous area.

Members of Montreal’s Moroccan community gathered at La Amistad Cafe on Saturday morning as they awaited updates regarding the 6.8 magnitude earthquake that damaged infrastructure and took the lives of more than 2000 people on Friday night. Gloria Henriquez

Serge Sasseville, a Montreal city councillor, is currently vacationing in Morocco and was attending a gathering at a friend’s house about 25 minutes outside downtown Marrakesh when the earthquake first hit.

“It was really, really scary,” he said, adding that he, alongside a group of friends, gathered under blankets and lawn chairs outside while they awaited an expected aftershock following the first rumbling.

“You’re not in control of anything, you’re waiting for the worst to happen.”

The U.S. Geological Survey reported a 4.9 magnitude aftershock arrived 19 minutes later.

Sasseville said although no one was injured in his immediate circle, his friend’s house had sustained some damage and lost electricity during the earthquake. After sheltering in place for hours, he commuted back to his hotel in Marrakech at about 4:30 a.m. on Saturday.

Upon returning to the city, Sasseville said he witnessed hundreds of people sleeping on sidewalks and in parks. He said as of now, there have been fewer causalities inc Marrakech in comparison to harder-impacted areas outside of the city.

“The previous official toll from the Department of Interior was 820 and I could see that in Marrakech, out of the 820 deaths, there were 13,” he said during an interview with Global News on Saturday morning.

People prepare to burry a man who was killed by the earthquake, in Moulay Brahim village, near Marrakech, Morocco, Saturday, Sept. 9, 2023.

(AP Photo/Mosa’ab Elshamy).

Many tourist attractions have experienced significant damage in the city’s main square, including the historic Jemaa el Fnaa mosque, which saw some of its tower partially collapse.

“My heart is with the family and friends of the people that were killed and wounded,” Sasseville said.

“Moroccans are very resilient people … Nobody has ever lived (through) an earthquake of such magnitude in Morocco, it’s terrible, I went through some minor earthquakes in the province of Quebec but that’s nothing compared to what happened last night in Morocco.”

Quebec Premier François Legault expressed his condolences in a social media post on Saturday.

“All my thoughts are with the Moroccan people,” he said.

There has been nothing bigger than a 6.0 magnitude earthquake within 500 kilometres of Friday night’s epicentre since before 1900.

Because it struck at 23:11 local time, it’s projected that the death toll will be larger than other earthquakes of similar intensity, as many people were likely to be inside affected buildings.

It’s estimated about 1,200 people have sustained injuries from the incident, but that official number is expected to rise.

Federal Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly has urged Canadians in Morocco to register with Global Affairs Canada after a deadly earthquake struck the country late Friday night.

In a tweet this morning, Joly says Canada’s thoughts are with all of those affected by the devastating quake.



She says Canadians in Morocco who need help should contact the federal Emergency Watch and Response Centre, which can provide emergency consular assistance.

Global Affairs Canada says it is working on an update about how many Canadians were in Morocco at the time of the disaster.

— With files from Global News’ Gloria Henriquez and the Canadian Press