Grand Canyon age denial story: a hoax?

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UPDATE: The story is apparently not a hoax. The park website and the park rangers are saying different things. The Kos diarist told me to keep the website secret from the creationists, as it is our "last citadel".
(Photo stolen from Travis Swicegood)

I hope this is an exaggeration:

HOW OLD IS THE GRAND CANYON? PARK SERVICE WON’T SAY — Orders to Cater to Creationists Makes National Park Agnostic on Geology

Washington, DC — Grand Canyon National Park is not permitted to give an official estimate of the geologic age of its principal feature, due to pressure from Bush administration appointees. Despite promising a prompt review of its approval for a book claiming the Grand Canyon was created by Noah's flood rather than by geologic forces, more than three years later no review has ever been done and the book remains on sale at the park, according to documents released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).

(HT: pinche tejano on Kos) I took a quick look over at the National Park Service Grand Canyon Site, and as I point out on Kos, someone over there didn't get the creationist message:
Did You Know?
The Cambrian seas of the Grand Canyon were home to several kinds of trilobite, whose closest living relative is the modern horsehoe crab. They left their fossil record in the mud of the Bright Angel Shale over 500 million years ago.
And from the Grand Canyon FAQ:

How old is the Canyon?

That's a tricky question. Although rocks exposed in the walls of the canyon are geologically quite old, the Canyon itself is a fairly young feature. The oldest rocks at the canyon bottom are close to 2000 million years old. The Canyon itself - an erosional feature - has formed only in the past five or six million years. Geologically speaking, Grand Canyon is very young.
(Emphasis added.) So is the PEER story wrong? Or are we soon going to see some changes to the FAQ and other sections of the website?

Comments

grishnash said…
I don't know what the current status is, but when I last visited the Grand Canyon just over two years ago, they definitely were giving the correct geologic age of the canyon on guided tours. The Creationist book mentioned in the article, however, was for sale in the bookstore.
8:41 AM, December 30, 2006
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