10,000 Visitors Meet 2,500 Bears at Katmai National Park

July 17, 2012|By Dan Fiorucci | Channel 2 News

KATMAI NATIONAL PARK, Alaska — It is one of the least visited National Parks in the United States, but what it lacks in tourists -- it makes up for in wonders.

Katmai National Park is home to the greatest concentration of protected Brown Bears anywhere in the world. An estimated 2500 of the animals roam the land here and in neighboring McNeilRiver State Park.

That is more Brown Bears in this one area than in all of the Lower-48 combined.

The park draws 10,000 visitors to Brooks Camp, where 100 of those bears enjoy feasting on the July Salmon Runs.

The odds of meeting a bear are so high, that the Park Service requires every visitor to attend a bear-safety lecture upon arrival in Brooks.

But the bears aren't the only attraction at Katmai.

It is also possible to ride out to the site of the biggest volcanic eruption of the 20th Century.

The Novarupta Volcano exploded 100 years ago this summer (well, technically this spring. The eruption took place on June 6th, 1912).It put a foot of ash on rooftops in Kodiak 100 miles away!

Remarkably, no one was killed by the immediate blast of the eruption -- even though it was bigger than Krakatoa (techincally called Krakatau) or Vesuvius, and way bigger than Mt. St. Helens (30 times bigger).

One woman did ultimately die from respiratory problems created by the ash. She lived in Kodiak.

And with an eruption of 3 cubic miles of magma, it put out enough ash and rock to fill the entire municipality of Anchorage tod a depth of 1.5 miles (according to Judy Fierstein of theU.S. Geological Survey).

If you visit Katmai, you can see the remnants of Novarupta. Ash deposits 1 mile from the vent are 800 feet thick.

Geologists say that if it ever erupted again like it did in 1912 (and one day it will), it would bring air traffic to a halt all over North America and devastate the economy of Alaska.

Fortunately, it's not likely to erupt in our lifetimes.

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