Big Sur landslide creates enough debris to fill 800 Olympic-sized swimming pools

BIG SUR, Calif. (Lisa Fernandez/KTVU) - The landslide that rained down on the southern tip of Big Sur was so huge, the dirt could have filled 800 Olympic-sized swimming pools, buried Highway 1 more than 65 feet deep, and created about 13 acres of new land, now in the ocean.

So says the US Geological Survey after analyzing new aerial photos of a series of slides on May 20.

As of May 31, the slide was still covering one-third of a mile of the highway, even after 200,000 dump truck loads had been removed.

Dramatic images showed a major differences in topography. In March, for example, the hills were green and the roadway was clear. The next month, the landslide had turned the hills a light tan, and the highway was socked in debris.