All that stands between you
and a pool of boiling, rotten-egg-smelling,
acidic water is a humble boardwalk.
And your good judgment.
Stray off the path,
and you could be headed
toward quite the swim.
Heads up,
scorching temperatures
would be just the start of your problems.
Yellowstone National Park
is one of the most iconic in the U.S.
And it's situated atop a volcanic hot spot.
If you decided to take an off-trail hike,
you could accidentally walk
right into Emerald Spring.
This hot spring is located
in the Norris Geyser Basin.
And it looks spectacular.
Except you'd notice that
the visuals don't make up for the stench.
Yeah, you’d catch a whiff of what smells
like rotten eggs.
That's the result of sulfur-eating
microorganisms that create sulfuric acid.
The acid evaporates and turns into
hydrogen sulfide gas,
which gives off a putrid aroma.
Get a little closer and you’ll be able
to feel that the green waters are hot.
Sizzling hot.
There’s no way
you’d want to even stick a toe in them.
But that might not be up to you.
As you approached
the dazzling-but-stinky hot spring,
the ground around it would seem solid.
And then you hear a crack.
The ground at your feet
gave way to your body weight.
You were standing on a delicate crust
formed by underground minerals,
dissolved by the water
and then redeposited
on the surface of the spring.
All of this made the crust
as thin and fragile as a sheet of ice.
Your whole body
would be completely submerged.
You'd now understand why the word
“hot” in “hot springs”
is not an understatement.
The blazing temperatures,
hitting 82 °C (180 °F) in places,
would send a sharp pain through your skin.
That's dangerously close
to water’s boiling point.
For context,
temperatures of 50 °C (120°F)
can give you third-degree burns
in five minutes.
If you fell into Emerald Spring,
chances are
you'd be dead in three minutes or less.
Now before things get really nasty,
you could try to push through the pain
and pull yourself out of this mess.
But even then,
the outcome wouldn't be pretty.
You would end up in a hospital
in critical condition, clinging to your life.
But if you didn't make it out in time,
you'd begin to boil from the inside out.
And this would just be the agonizing start
of your very unavoidable demise.
You see, hydrothermal vents help
turn Emerald Spring
into a potent acid bath by perpetually
infusing it with chemical microbes.
On top of that,
microorganisms compound the problem
by breaking off pieces of surrounding rock
and adding sulfuric acid to the pool.
All that makes falling into Emerald Spring
the near-equivalent
of dousing yourself with hydrochloric acid.
When Emerald Spring's water
touched your skin,
it would cause your tissue
to swell and bubble.
If it wasn't for your gurgling
you'd be able to feel the popping
of your exploding blood vessels.
You'd start to bleed out.
The fat under
your skin would also begin to bubble.
And with all that screaming,
you'd swallow more
and more liquid acid
that would burn through your stomach
and destroy your internal organs.
If your lifeless body
wasn't pulled out in time,
all that will remain of you
would be a thick coat of blood,
fat and tissue,
floating on top of the emerald green water.
After a 23-year-old man fell into
a hot spring in the Norris Geyser Basin,
authorities had to delay
retrieving his body due to a thunderstorm.
The next day,
nothing of the unfortunate visitor's
body remained.
Urban legend has it all the authorities
found were his wallet and flip-flops.
Sadly, he’s just one of 22 people known
to have died from
hot spring-related injuries
in and around Yellowstone since 1890.
In a best-case scenario,
you would end up in critical care battling
third-degree burns.
Worst case,
you're dissolved into a fizzy goo.
So follow the park rules
and don't wander off the designated paths.
Of course,
that will never guarantee your safety.
After all, Yellowstone Park
does sit on top of an active supervolcano.
And it might be ready
to erupt any day now.
But that’s a story for another WHAT IF.