Zuni salt lake endangered

Zuni Salt Lake is one of the great unknown awesome places. The sight of an eagle circling upward inside the volcano cinder cone, below us and reflected in the water at the bottom, and then flying away at eye level is never to be forgotten. There are so few places on this earth where no humanmade sounds, including mechanical ones, are to be heard. I couldn't understand why suddenly this site is listed as number two on the National Trust for Historic Preservation endangered sites, but it's threatened by a contemplated Fence Lake coal strip-mining project. The volcanic cinder cone seems to be known to vulcanologists. Apparently it's really a tufa cone or "maar."