Heavy snow, dangerous road conditions close Yosemite National Park

After days of heavy snow made the roads dangerous and impassable, Yosemite National Park closed to visitors on Saturday. It won’t open again until Thursday.

“We’ve had a lot of cars spinning over the past few days,” said park spokesman Scott Gediman, adding that there were no injuries. “We couldn’t keep up with road clearing, so today we made the decision to close the park.”

He said visitors had been asked to clean up, but some residents and workers remained in the valley. “At some places in the park the power goes out; it’s intermittent so we crouch down like everyone else,” he said. “I’ve been a ranger here for 27 years and I’ve never seen so much snow.”

Yosemite Valley will be under a winter storm watch from Sunday afternoon through Wednesday afternoon, according to the National Weather Service, with the possibility of 69 inches of snow and wind gusts of up to 40 mph.