Illustration by Elizabeth Brockway/The Daily Beast
Over Labor Day weekend, 70,000 people were trapped in the middle of the desert by a series of freak rainstorms.
It was touch and go for a few days, as it was unclear when the weather would clear enough for everybody to safely evacuate. Supplies were dwindling. There was no access to clean bathrooms.
If those 70,000 people had been marooned in a small South Sudanese city, nobody would have laughed at the unfolding of a potential mass tragedy. But those 70,000 people were trapped at Burning Man, and so it was hilarious.