Will Oak Flat Soon Become a 1,000-Foot Crater?

When Jack Colavita, a high school English teacher in Scottsdale, Arizona, gets out of school at 3 p.m., he typically heads straight for the boulders.

Specifically, he drives 65 miles east to Queen Creek Canyon, drags his crashpads out to classic Oak Flat problems such as Scatterbrain (V6-7) or Evolution (V7-), and works powerful moves on the volcanic, pocketed rock that Tommy Caldwell once compared to “the mouths of tiny piranhas.”

Oak Flat, a sub-area of the Queen Creek Canyon, is a world-class climbing area with more than 2,500 routes and boulders within easy access of the fifth-largest American city. From 1989 to 2004, it hosted the Phoenix Bouldering Contest (PBC, eventually renamed the Phoenix Boulder Blast), which attracted up to 600 competitors each year, including teenage prodigies Caldwell, Beth Rodden, Katie Brown, and Chris Sharma.

Erik Murdock, PhD, who now works as the deputy director of policy and government affairs for Access Fund, remembers one particularly exciting PBC in 1996: “I spotted Chris Sharma on a warm up. Then, he spent the entire comp trying the open project because if he sent it, he won.” That afternoon, Sharma, who was 14 years old at the time, sent the problem and took first place.

Today, Oak Flat is still the go-to spot for Phoenix locals looking to squeeze in a few hours of climbing after school or work. “For a local area less than two hours away, Oak Flat is the only place where you can really spend a day and not break a hold,” says Colavita, who leads climbing trips through his school’s outdoors program. “It’s the place where kids are able to go for a day with parents’ permission.”

However, after a two-decade-long legal battle, Arizona climbers are steeling themselves for the potential destruction of most of the boulders and sport routes in the Oak Flat area.

On April 17, the U.S. Forest Service released a 60-day advance warning of its publication of the Final Environmental Impact Statement for Oak Flat—a document that will trigger the transfer of 2,422 acres of the Oak Flat area to Resolution Copper, a mining project co-owned by the British-Australian company Rio Tinto and Australian company BHP. While Resolution Copper currently operates around many Oak Flat crags, if this land transfer occurs, it intends to expand its mining operation to include “panel caving” which would eventually result in a ground crater up to 1.8 miles wide and 1,115 feet deep, according to the Forest Service. This mining technique is considered a cost-effective way to access targeted copper reserves, but it will cause, according to Access Fund, the “largest-ever loss of climbing on America’s public lands.”

Climbers have long been engaged in the legal battle over Oak Flat, but the growing immediacy of the Forest Service’s land transfer has hit hard.

“The litigation has looked pretty pessimistic since about two years ago,” says Colavita. “It’s a weird vibe. People are pulling out their investments with their time and their energy in the area. We can always see the mine looming above us like the Eye of Sauron or something.”

A Two-Decade Battle Comes to a Head

This 60-day warning from the federal government represents the culmination of a long, well-documented legal and public relations battle for control of Oak Flat.

For nearly 20 years, Resolution Copper has sought permission to mine an estimated 40 billion pounds of copper beneath Queen Creek Canyon, which sits squarely within Arizona’s “Copper Triangle” east of Phoenix.

Starting in 2005, U.S. Senators for Arizona John McCain and Jeff Flake, who supported the copper mine’s expansion, attempted to pass a land swap that would give 2,422 acres of Tonto National Forest land, including the entire Oak Flat area, to Resolution Copper. In exchange, the U.S. Forest Service would receive 5,459 acres of the mining company’s private land in Arizona. McCain predicted that the mining project would create as many as 4,000 jobs and contribute “tens of billions of dollars” in economic activity over the life of the mine.

For centuries, the San Carlos Apache tribe, which calls the area Chi’chil Biłdagoteel, has used it as a sacred site for conducting religious rituals, such as coming-of-age ceremonies, as well as gathering water and medicinal plants. A former historic preservation officer for the neighboring White Mountain Apache Tribe,  John Welch, has called the area “the best set of Apache archaeological sites ever documented, full stop,” and in 2016 it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. “I’ve been out there [to climb] and driven around the corner and seen an Indigenous ceremony happening,” says Colavita. “Even without any of the copper mine stuff going on, there would still be a deference: This is sacred Indigenous land before this is climbing land.”

After trying and failing for years to pass the land swap as its own bill, in December 2014, McCain and Flake performed a legislative sleight of hand that, while common in Congress, was widely criticized as undemocratic. In a last-minute “midnight rider,” the pair slipped the land swap into a 1,600-page, must-pass defense spending authorization bill that President Obama signed that month. The new federal law required the U.S. Forest Service to perform a three-step process: (1) publishing a Draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the land transfer, (2) collecting public comments to incorporate the final version, and (3) officially handing the land titles to Resolution Copper within 60 days of publishing the Final EIS, whatever it may contain.

The first step occurred in August 2019, when the Forest Service released a 1,400-page draft EIS. The following 90-day public comment period—step two—ultimately received more than 29,000 comments by hand, mail, email, web form, or verbally at public meetings. On January 15, 2021, five days before an administration turnover, the Forest Service triggered the third step by releasing the Final EIS. But on March 1, the Biden administration ordered the Forest Service to withdraw its statement on the grounds that more time was needed to understand the concerns raised by the Apache tribe and other stakeholders.

In an explicit change of policy, on March 20, 2025, the Trump administration released an Executive Order titled “Immediate Measures to Increase American Mineral Production” that directed all heads of agencies involved in mineral production to expedite approvals for projects awaiting permits. Shortly afterward, on April 17, the Forest Service announced their intention to re-publish the Final Resolution Copper EIS—the new step three—as early as June 16. When that happens, unless an organization such as Apache Stronghold or Access Fund sues the Final EIS for inadequately addressing concerns with the Draft EIS, Oak Flat would officially belong to Resolution Copper within two months. After the land transfer, everyday Arizonans would only have access to the area until the mining company deems it unsafe for the public.

Currently, the Supreme Court is considering a review of Apache Stronghold v. United States, which challenges the Forest Service’s right to destroy sacred land in Oak Flat. If the Supreme Court takes the case, especially before June 16, the Forest Service may delay releasing the Final EIS and will potentially hold off on the land transfer. Without the Supreme Court’s intervention or further legal challenges, the swap will likely occur between June 16 and August 15.

Oak Flat: Turning Comp Climbers Into Outdoor Crushers

If the land swap proceeds, Phoenix’s growing climbing community will have thousands fewer routes and boulders to help indoor climbers transition to the outdoors.

Before Sierra Blair was a Team USA climber, a World Cup competitor, or a Pan American Bouldering Champion, she was a nine-year-old kid who followed her climbing coach and teammates to Oak Flat. It was there, in the desert riparian hills just an hour-and-a-half drive from her gym, that Blair learned how to lead climb. “I remember walking by The Hulk as a kid,” she says, referencing the V11 boulder. “That thing looked crazy. The holds were so small, but it was somehow in my head on a list of boulders I wanted to do at some point.”

After focusing on indoor competition climbing for 14 years, Blair decided in 2023 to switch up her focus to the outdoors. At Oak Flat, she stumbled into another classic, Pyramid (V10), and nearly flashed it. “At the time, I was recovering from an injury and didn’t know how hard I could climb, so it was this cool confidence boost for me,” she said. Next on her list: The Hulk, from her childhood tick list, which she put down in two quick weekends.

Over the next two years, Blair’s interest in climbing the volcanic rock formations would connect her directly to the legacy of the Phoenix Bouldering Contest. During the 2002 or 2003 competition, Chris Sharma first sent a 14-foot overhang called Captain Hook (V12), but since then, a crucial hold had broken off. In spite of the broken hold, Blair made the second ascent in March 2024, opting to keep the original grade. “I thought it was impossible, especially with the break, and I was excited to get the boulder done in a few sessions,” she told 8a.nu. “It’s definitely a very proud line at Oak Flat.”

Watch Blair send Double D Low, another V12 at Oak Flat:

Sharp pockets and comp-style moves make Oak Flat “a moonboarder’s dream,” says Blair. “The grades are a little sandbagged, but you get used to the sandbag and then your skin just becomes indestructible anywhere else,” she says. “After I’ve been climbing all season [at Oak Flat], you could stab me in the skin and nothing would happen. My skin could take it.” She says that she’s done the majority of her outdoor climbing there and emphasizes that Oak Flat has something for all ability levels.

Colavita thinks that Oak Flat has the potential to turn even more indoor competition climbers into outdoor crushers. “I’ve seen firsthand how these kids can go out there and crush, especially in a place like Oak Flat, which has savage but straightforward movement,” says the schoolteacher.

He adds that he’s seen many kids in Phoenix getting into climbing through indoor competition, and doesn’t want them to lose out on the beauty of the outdoors. “If Oak Flat doesn’t exist and it keeps getting hotter in this city, it’s going to go from being a great outdoor climbing location to one where it’s nearly impossible.”

Protecting the popular gym-to-crag area from the mine, he argues, is “how you keep the tradition of [Phoenix] climbing about being outside—about respect and reverence for the planet.”

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