Talk:Racetrack Playa

Split off "Sailing stones"?
A local news report covered the sailing stones last night, and it took me a bit of hunting to find this article. I've create a couple redirects to make it a bit easier to find, but perhaps a new article is in order? I think that there's more than enough good material here to justify a separate article...especially since the bulk of this article is about the stones. Objections? Comments? -- MisterHand 14:22, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
 * There were no objections, so I've gone ahead and made the split. -- MisterHand 14:35, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Well, I'm going to request that they be merged back together, having two articles about the same thing is confusing.. Cap020570 (talk) 18:21, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
 * The Sailing stone article covers sailing stones at not only Racetrack Playa. Mojoworker (talk) 07:49, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

Are the sailing stones the reason for the name "Racetrack"? If so, then the articles should be together, IMHO.63.82.23.2 (talk) 21:52, 17 June 2013 (UTC)

Agree. The article Sailing stone and this one overlap almost completely, and so should be merged. Also the hexagonal mud columns should be explained and linked to the appropriate article (they are convection cells (Bénard cells). David Spector (talk) 00:54, 30 July 2013 (UTC)


 * I'm not seeing that they "overlap almost completely" – can you elaborate? I just see a small section here on sailing stones, with the rest dealing with Racetrack Playa itself. Feel free to trim down the section on sailing stones if you feel it's overly verbose. And as I mentioned previously, Sailing stone also deals with sailing stones at locations other than Racetrack Playa such as Little Bonnie Claire Playa in Nevada. Mojoworker (talk) 22:55, 30 July 2013 (UTC)

Update Latest Research Results
The following paper relates research findings that explain the physical cause of the sailing stones. Citation: Norris RD, Norris JM, Lorenz RD, Ray J, Jackson B (2014) Sliding Rocks on Racetrack Playa, Death Valley National Park: First Observation of Rocks in Motion. PLoS ONE 9(8): e105948. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0105948 I don't have time to edit the article at the moment, but anyone interested can read the paper and do so.  — M3TA  info  (  view  )  21:49, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

I copied the text someone else added to Sailing stones referencing the paper, which should do for now.  — M3TA  info  (  view  )  22:00, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

Vandalism of the playa
Some unconfirmed blog post reports that the playa has been vandalised by people driving around the surface leaving tyre marks and people chiselling initials into the sailing stones: http://petapixel.com/2016/09/19/vandalism-iconic-racetrack-death-valley-national-park/

Wonder if there's a reliable confirmation/source of this and whether it's relevant to include in the article? O0factuallycorrect0o (talk) 21:19, 10 November 2016 (UTC)
 * Google it. You'll find several good sources CapnZapp (talk) 14:49, 11 November 2016 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: California Natural History
— Assignment last updated by Py175yp (talk) 21:12, 11 October 2023 (UTC)