The collapse of Darwin’s Arch in the Galapagos got me to thinking: what other naturally-occurring beautiful and magnificent things have naturally fallen apart in the last, say, century-ish? I’m asking about full destruction, if not of the whole thing, then at least the part of it that made it stand out; I’m also not talking about something looking slightly different now than it did a century ago because of erosion. Which brings me to my second point: I’m talking about things that fell apart naturally, and not because of human activity (vandalism, climate change, well-intentioned “improvements,” etc.).
The thing that came most immediately came to mind, for me, was New Hampshire’s Old Man of the Mountain rock formation, which collapsed in 2003, presumably due to natural erosion (although I’m not qualified to say whether or not human activity played zero role in its destruction).
Human activity worked to prevent it’s inevitable destruction. It was a pile of rocks in the midst of a slow collapse since it was first spotted. Took some imagination to see the profile of an old man there, I’ve seen potatoes with more resemblance to Richard Nixon.
one example was Goblin Valley State Park in Utah, which, because I learned that locally the balanced rocks were called “Goblins”, made me immediately think that “Goblin Toppler” should enter the American lexicon as a minced oath for jerkoffs.
Natural Bridges State Beach in Santa Cruz, CA comes to mind. There used to be three connected arches, but only one remains.
Not sure of a tree counts, but in Yosemite, the famous Jeffrey Pine atop Sentinel Dome died and eventually fell down in recent years. Here is Adams’ photo of the live tree I think from the 1940s:
In Calaveras Big Trees State Park in California, the Tunnel Tree fell over in a storm not too long ago. There are photos of people and the tree from the 1800s. I have photos of my family walking thru the tree as well.
Niagara Falls is naturally retreating albeit at a slower rate in recent years. One of the more spectacular rockfalls there was the 1954 Prospect Point collapse. I remember a few falls from the 70’s and 80’s when I was living in the area although some of those were aided by engineers so they would happen in a controlled manner.
there’s a story that :Landscape Arch and Delicate Arch (the more famous one shown at the beginning of that video) had their names accidentally interchanged. It’s probably apocryphal, but I do prefer the names the other way around
The Azure Window (which appeared in the original 1981 Clash of the Titans) colapsed four years ago
There are a lot of observation points in the Yellowstone canyon, where you can go down a boardwalk stair to a railinged platform, and get some spectacular views. There are also the remains of a lot of other such points that have since eroded away. The points themselves might not be all that notable, but the views from them are.
