OLYMPIC NATIONAL PARK — U.S. Highway 101 is closed at Lake Crescent due to an active rockslide — and will remain so into Thursday morning.
Geotechnical engineers have been notified and will examine Thursday whether the hillside over the winding road along the lake’s shore is stable enough to reopen the main highway between the east and west sides of the Olympic Peninsula.
Westbound residential traffic is allowed to drive as far as East Beach Road, and eastbound residential traffic can access Lake Crescent Road at Barnes Point.
The rockslide occurred at about 12:10 p.m., while construction crews working for the Olympic National Park were scaling loose rock from a hillside at Milepost 228 adjacent to the lake.
Two workers were removing loose rock and securing large slabs of rock to the hillslide when a slab gave way underneath the workers. Both were attached to safety ropes secured above the slide area, and did not fall with the rock, said National Park Service road foreman Dwayne Travis.
“One of them got a bruise,” he said.
Travis said the scaling operation was part of a 7-year maintenance cycle to reduce the risk of loose rocks falling on the road, and that the slide was unexpected.
“This stuff really doesn’t happen often,” he said.
Current road information is available by calling Olympic National Park’s information line at 360-565-3131 or online at nps.gov/olym.
Real-time information for state highways is also available by dialing 5-1-1, signing up for email/text alerts via the Web or by visiting the Department of Transportation’s Travel Alerts page.
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Reporter Arwyn Rice can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5070, or at arwyn.rice@peninsuladailynews.com.
