We begin this
hour with
thousands of people in a sticky situation
in the Nevada desert.
This is a new CNN drone video of people
who came for the normally sun
soaked Burning Man festival,
but extreme weather intervened.
This video taken just a short time ago
as the revelers were making their way
out of the BlackRock Desert in Nevada.
A storm dumped two or three months
worth of rain in just 24 hours.
One death during
the downpour is being investigated.
The ten days have been bogged down
and thick ankle
deep mud
making driving impossible,
walking a slog,
being told to conserve
water, food and fuel.
But things are slowly improving.
Earlier, I spoke to one woman
stranded there
and asked her about the conditions
Well, here is what it looks like
on your feet. It's horrible, wet.
Everything is muddy.
But all of our spirits are really high.
Like the previous person said.
We're all kind of coming together
in the community, making sure
we all get packed up and break down
camp safely.
Everybody's eating,
everybody's got water.
Everything is pretty good.
CNN's Camilla Bernal joins us now.
Camilla, I was just amazed
you probably couldn't
see the video from where you're standing.
But as I was talking to this woman,
she picked up her foot
and she showed
what looked like
two or three inches of thick mud
stuck to the bottom of her shoe.
And I guess this is
what people were dealing
with in the middle of all this.
But I guess
things are improving somewhat.
Give us the latest
Well, Jim, it's still really messy.
And I don't have to see the video
because there were so many people
that I saw here walking out of the playa.
Just to give you some perspective
of where I am.
The players right here behind me.
And so the festival is only
just a couple of miles from where I am.
So throughout the day,
I saw dozens
and dozens of people
with those cakey shoes
with mud all over their bodies.
The cars are covered in mud.
I saw a number of RVs
getting stuck behind me
here in the desert.
That's what you're seeing today.
And people are saying, look,
I want to get out no matter what.
The people
that I talked to today
told me
we needed to get out
for one reason or another,
which is why they decided to either walk
or try
to get their cars
here, despite the fact
that there is a shelter in place.
They decided to come out
and that's what they were calling
the beginning of the exodus.
They say tomorrow
it is going to be even worse
because there's going to be more people
wanting to get out
because of the situation
of not having maybe enough water or food.
There is a lot of people who are saying,
look, we're sharing,
we're dividing our portions.
They're all coming together
to help each other.
They're all very positive.
Everyone that I talked to had told me
that they're having a great time,
that they're happy.
But there was some concern about
what kind of food and supplies
they had for the rest of the days,
depending on
how long they had to be here.
And of course,
everyone that I talked to today
telling me that it was very difficult
to walk out of the festival.
Here's one of those attendees.
And what she told me
It's quite expansive out there.
And it probably took me 3 hours
of slogging to to walk
just from my camp to the road.
And I did get a little bit of a hitchhike
into the back of someone's truck.
But yeah, it's just really thick,
dense mud.
So wherever it's wet,
it's just heavy and sticky
and it's a real sloppy mess out there.
Most everything's turned off,
but there's still some people partying
and it's not easy.
Like she said, it's a sloppy mess,
but there's still hundreds
and thousands of people
that are in the playa
that are here behind me,
just miles away dealing with that
mud still.
Again, they're all very positive
and saying they're in a good mood
and trying to make
the best out of the situation.
Unfortunately, there was one death report
They said authorities
saying that they found one individual
in the playa.
They did not give specific
as to
what happened
exactly when
or what was the cause of death.
But authorities did say
they reached out to the family
to let them know.
But again,
this is a community coming together
and saying that they're going to
be out here.
The man is going to burn tonight
so there will be a burn tonight.
So they will continue to have fun Jim.
All right, Camila Bernal.
And we saw that tow truck
going behind you just a few moments ago.
I suspect
there is some tow trucks
that are busy over the next day or two.
Camila, thank you very much.
Appreciate it.
Joining us now is Andrew Hyde.
He is one of the thousands
of festival goers stuck at Burning Man.
Andrew, I guess, is that a fair way
of putting it? You're stuck right now.
What's going on? What can you tell us
I mean, we're stuck in and we can't move.
But we also are planning on being here
for a couple of days.
So we're here, we're enjoying it.
And the rain has
definitely put a damper on that.
But we're in an extreme environment
and we're prepared for that
and enjoying it.
And Andrew,
I guess take us back to
when this all got started.
What happened How bad did it get
where there are folks
who were not prepared
who got sort of
caught in the middle of it?
And why did so many people leave?
There were so many folks who
packed up and left
and they didn't
stick it out like you are.
Take us back. Tell us.
Tell us about everything
that's taken place
over the last day or two.
Yeah, I mean, the schedule,
the ending of the festival is tomorrow.
So a lot of people
that are leaving
early, that's a normal, normal activity
for the burn.
Generally, that burn is on Saturday
and Sunday burn.
So then people leaving early happens
every year.
It's not it's not
something that is abnormal.
Rain started on Friday night.
It's been 30 minutes.
That lasted about 6 hours,
a pretty big amount.
And it made this beautiful pie
that we have here,
which is usually dust in this very fine,
very dry environment,
very muddy and very wet and made it.
So even walking
100 yards is almost impossible.
So for a couple of hours
there you are absolutely stuck
wherever you're at.
If you're out on a walk or an adventure,
you lived there for a little bit.
And so you can safely get back
and people have started
to test the waters
and see if their vehicle
can make the roadways
and people are making it out.
Some people are walking out,
but people are kind of getting back
to their normal lives.
Yeah.
And we
talked to
one woman earlier on in this program
and she showed us
the bottom of her shoes,
you know, in the middle of the live shot
And I thought it was
it was pretty illustrative
of what you guys have been dealing with.
She had like two or three
inches of mud
just caked on to the bottom of her shoes.
Is that what it's
been like trying to get around
Yeah.
I mean,
if it's a traffic spot where a car
is, man, it's it's water, mud.
If it's
someplace that has been used
at some place, you can walk for miles.
I think I walked five or six miles today
with no issue.
But when the rain hits,
it becomes sloppy and slippery. Sloppy.
You can't move anywhere.
And I think we might have missed it.
Andrew, we missed
you holding up your shoe.
How do you how do your shoes look?
Try that again.
They're they're pretty good.
They're pretty good.
Let's try this out.
Oh, yeah, definitely bad.
Luck.
Yeah. Yeah.
You'll be throwing those out or waving
organs now.
I I'll hang on to them.
I like to finish.
And it sounds like you're a pro at this
or a veteran at this.
You've done
this Burning Man festival before.
Or maybe you've talked
to other folks who've been here before.
Is it really that unusual
to see this much rain coming in
and not to put you on the spot too much?
Is this something
that festival organizers
might have to be prepared for next year?
Might be
they might need to be better
prepared for next year.
Yeah, I think about every 20 years
this is going to happen out
here in the desert.
I think
the board has
been really prepared for it.
I mean, they've been really communicative
You know, they've got service last night.
Like it's not really
not a life or death situation,
but people that
abide by the ten
principles of Burning Man
and one of which
is being radically self-reliant.
So, you know, I come out here every year.
I love it.
It's this lovely arts festival
in the middle of a barren wasteland
and beauty
because of the duality of life
and duality of the art
and the culture and just kind of
this place.
It's really far from a lot of things.
Making a city.
And
so I'm very well prepared,
but almost
everybody here is very well prepared.
And the people that are doing it
right are really relaxed right now
that are doing it wrong
or really kind of scrambling
and having to try to make friends and,
you know,
make sure they have enough food
and water for the next couple of days.
But yeah, we, you know, we're burners.
We're pretty tough.
We're pretty prepared.
Yeah.
We saw the video of Chris Rock and Diplo.
I don't know if you saw this
or if you check this out,
but apparently Chris Rock had
also that one.
Yeah.
They had
hitchhiked their way out of there.
Did you encounter folks doing this
kind of things?
You're just trying to get
get out of Dodge.
Yeah, well, it get better.
They walked out of it.
They walked out.
So they stayed in the mud five miles.
They walked,
and then they're going to impact the
pickup truck or one that was supporters
kind of down that way,
which many people are choosing to do.
You know,
I met one gentleman yesterday
who's a surgeon
and just had to get back to the hospital.
So he decided to put on his shoes
get all the stuff
in a safe place where he knew
is going to get out of here
because this is a leave.
No trace of that.
So all of our stuff
we bring in, we have to take out.
I think you can just abandon it.
So you've got to take care
of those logistics
and take care of
of your friends and family here
and make sure you don't burn.
And that was the work
that you were supposed to do
as part of your camper,
part of your set up here.
But yeah, we saw him get out.
I thought that was amazing.
I thought that was hilarious.
It was under a shelter in place.
So a little bit about, you know,
was that
tasteful or not that
that can be a conversation
that we'll have out here.
And
but I think
they made the best choice with the,
you know,
whatever information they had
and maybe they had to be someplace.
I respect them for it.
Sounds like a very, very tough slog, but.
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, Andrew, you stay safe.
Get home safe.
Thanks very much for your time.
We appreciate it.
Hey, thank you.