Virtually Every Road in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park is Closed

First it was flooding that closed many key roads in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, now a winter storm dumped enough snow to create another headache, virtually every road is closed due to snow and ice including the Foothills Parkway West and East and the Gatlinburg Bypass connecting the Sugarlands to the Spur.

Crews are working on plowing and sanding roads right now. They will also be cleaning up any of the additional trees, branches and roads that may have fallen into the roadways. When the melting starts, even more debris could fall into the roadway making driving treacherous.

With so much water, there have been landslides, one of which washed out a 200 foot section of roadway, and rock slides and trees that may still be in danger of falling so when the park access opens up, use extreme caution when hiking as some of these dangers may not be immediately apparent.

Links: Great Smoky Mountain national park road conditions

Cades Cove Loop Road and Greenbrier Road are closed. Other local roads flood due to high water

Cades Cove Loop Road and Greenbrier Road have both been closed today due to high water on numerous places from the past 30 hours of rain. Since close to 3 inches of rain has fallen in some areas creeks streams and rivers are spilling over their banks creating a mess for many on the Smoky Mountains.

There have been numerous traffic accidents in the Gatlinburg - Pigeon Forge - Sevierville area and a flood watch is in effect in Newport until 7 pm as the Pigeon River is expected to create flooding issues.

To make matters worse there is a wind advisory in effect today until 4 pm tomorrow so expect that trees will fall because of the saturated ground and high winds creating more power outages and telephone and internet service interruptions.

The Great Smoky Mountains national park is faring better than expected as other roads in the park have not been closed yet and though all the branches, creeks, streams and rivers are flooding they are yet to create any property or safety issues other than for those who will kayak or attempt to cross them in the dangerous state.

While it is possible that Cades Cove Loop Road may reopen today if the high waters recede, it is doubtful that Hyatt Lane, Sparks Lane, Forge Creek Road and Parsons Branch Road will open right away as vehicles driving over these gravel roads when they are saturated do serious damage to the roadway.

Greenbrier Road is closed right now and may reopen today, but the section of roadway to the Ramsey Cascades parking area will take at least a day before the water recedes enough for it to reopen.

Greenbrier section still closed but Cades Cove reopens as Great Smoky Mountains National park cleans up from flooding and storm damage

While the storm that drenched the Smoky Mountains was not packing much of a punch dropping from 2 to just less than 3 inches of rain in the past 24 hours in areas of the park, the saturated ground and rain swollen rivers could not handle any more and minor flooding was widespread in areas in and around the Great Smoky Mountains national park.

The Little Pigeon River created the most damage in the Great Smoky Mountains national park as it washed out an area of roadway along Greenbrier Road near the bridge to Ramsey Cascades where Middle Prong runs into the Little Pigeon River.

The video below shows the Little Pigeon River following over its bank and it effects were felt far downstream in the residential areas some of which had minor evacuations.

The Little River which flows out of Elkmont was rising quickly promoting an evacuation of the Elkmont Campgrounds in the Great Smoky Mountains national park and further downstream created problems for campgrounds outside the park and resident in Townsend and Walland. The Campground has been deemed safe and was just reopened.

In Cades Cove Sparks Lane which notoriously gets flooded was closed first followed by Hyatt Land and then the entire 11 miles of the Cades Cove Loop were closed as water stared building up in the back end. Cades Cove Loop has just reopened but Sparks Lane, Hyatt lane and Rich Mountain Road will remain closed until they dry out so that passing vehicles will not damage the road surface.

The Chimneys Picnic Area was also closed last night as rising waters from the Little Pigeon River started to flow over the banks.

Crews will be working today in the park surveying and cleaning what appears to be minor damage. Hikers should report any large downed trees or washout in back country but expect to have to climb over under or around obstructions in the trails for at least a few days.

Based upon the extent of the damage on Greenbrier Road reported to me by eyewitness yesterday don't expect Greenbrier to be open past the Ranger station for at least a day or 2. Hopefully while they have dump trucks in the area they will fix some of the preexisting immense holes in the road surface right now.