Earthly maintenance job to close Zion’s Angels Landing for 2 days

Petita Abblitt, 63, takes in the view of the canyon below while hiking Angels Landing, a 5-mile round-trip trail that climbs 1,500 feet up to the peak, in Utah's Zion National Park. (Rachel Crosby/Las Vegas Review-Journal)

Zion National Park’s iconic Angels Landing Trail will be closed for 12 hours over two days next week while a helicopter hauls away waste from toilets in the area.

The National Park Service plans to shut the West Rim Trail to Scouts Lookout and the Angels Landing Trail From 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Monday and Thursday, Sept. 22, to accommodate the waste-removal work, which park staff jokingly call the heli-poo operation.

The activity also will cause periodic closures and delays on Zion Scenic Drive between 10 a.m. and noon on the two work days.

The tricky waste-removal job is necessary to temporarily relieve a growing maintenance problem on the popular trail, where a pair of evaporative toilets designed to serve 50 people a day at Scouts Lookout are now being used by about 400 people daily.

To clear the toilets, the helicopter has to haul away 20 to 30 barrels of waste, each weighing approximately 500 pounds.

Contact Henry Brean at hbrean@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0350. Follow @RefriedBrean on Twitter.