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Cape Cod Chamber Officials And Tourism Businesses Unsure How Badly Coronavirus Will Impact Them

The coronavirus pandemic has upended the tourism industry. While states are beginning to relax restrictions on public gatherings, how, and when, and how the traveling public will react are questions that officials and businesses in tourist hotspots like Provincetown, Massachusetts, can't yet fully answer or know how to prepare for.

"It Looked Like Molten Lava. Except It Was Molten Ice."

"My first impression was that it looked like molten lava. Except it was molten ice. It had that same kind if pyroclastic flow to it," recalled Peter Christian of the day back in 2016 when he flew over a remote corner of Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve and saw a slurry of ice coursing rapidly downhill through a barren drainage.

Will Coronavirus Spur Changes To How We Visit National Parks?

Leading up to the 100th anniversary of the National Park Service back in 2016, there was much discussion about the future of the parks. Perhaps the hallmark was the Second Century Commission's report, prepared following a year of listening sessions, professional input, and discussion. Within its outline for strengthening the Park Service and the national parks in the 21st century were recommendations for better conservation of park resources, both natural and cultural. A decade later, the Park Service remains strapped for funds, overworked, and struggling in some places to manage crowds that impact natural resources and stress staff.