This year, on August 24, Burning Man Festival, the world-famous social gathering in Black Rock Desert in Nevada was supposed to kickstart its 39th year, calling on as many as 80,000 attendees from across the globe. But nature had other plans.
The festival opened under searing heat and 50-mile-per-hour winds that tore through camps, art installations, and even their notorious Orgy Dome, a sex tent that billed itself as a “sex positive community” teaching the value of consent. The organizers admitted defeat on Instagram: “Our build team worked so hard this past week to erect our lovely space. Unfortunately, the winds yesterday undid all that labor and wrecked our structure.”
The Orgy Dome has long been one of Burning Man’s most infamous attractions since its launch in 2004. Model Bri Teresi recently recalled her visit one year in the June 2021 episode of Sex Within An Hour podcast, describing it as “people doing all disgusting things… it smelled so bad,” she says. “We were just cracking up because it looked so ridiculous.” Her story only added to the mythology of the festival, known as a space for both spectacle and radical lifestyles.
By the opening of the festival, Burners reported traffic delays stretching up to eight hours just to reach the Playa, with attendees still expected despite more storms in the forecast. It was the third time in the past four years where the weather challenged Burners attending the festival from its sweltering heat reaching 106 degrees — 2022 being one of the worst heatwaves for the festival in recent memory — to a thick mud caused by heavy rains back in 2023.
A Burning Memory
Since its founding in 1986, the Burning Man Festival has long marketed itself as a radical experiment in art, community, and self-reliance. Held in Black Rock Desert every year, the week-long event builds a temporary city that culminates in the burning of a massive wooden effigy called “the Man” and a temple structure meant to embody self-expression and communal spirit.
Participants, known as Burners, are expected to contribute by creating art, joining collective projects, and partying to musical performances and DJ sets that stretch across the desert and well into the night. The festival also preaches its “leave no trace” principle, a polished version of a clean-as-you-go policy meant to keep the Playa, the event’s central hub, pristine.
While some see Burning Man as a long-running countercultural arts movement, others have criticized the festival as a magnet for Silicon Valley yuppies who see the desert as their networking playground. The festival, founded on non-profit ideals and communal living, now boasts private camps, lavish accommodations, and VIP exclusivity. In July 2025, Bloomberg reported that last year’s festival struggled to sell out tickets for the first time in over a decade despite spending $59 million; it effectively put the year’s revenue on track to fall $20 million short of expenses. As a result, the organization cut down on contractors and staff, reducing planned costs by 9 percent by the end of 2024, thus entering 2025 with “with no cushion to absorb another shortfall,” the report reads.
Burning Man is happening now through September 1.
