Graffiti found on rocks in Utah’s Arches National Park

Vandals took advantage of the government shutdown to scrawl graffiti on rocks at the understaffed Arches National Park in Utah, with a common theme: movies and video games.

Allyson Mathis told Outside magazine she witnessed Grug, FNAF and other graffiti painted on the stones while she visited the park this month.

Ms. Mathis, a retired National Park Service employee, said, “It was everywhere. It was heartbreaking and upsetting, but unfortunately not surprising.”

Grug refers to a character from the 2013 DreamWorks movie “The Croods,” while FNAF is from the video game and movie franchise “Five Nights at Freddy’s.”

Other graffiti at the park included a character from the online game “Among Us” as well as smiley faces and hand prints, according to SFGATE.

The park was open but understaffed during the shutdown, which ended Wednesday. Ms. Mathis told Outside that “if rangers were out on patrol, people might not have felt that they could vandalize the area.”

The National Park Service is investigating the damage, according to SFGATE. On the Arches National Park website, officials explain that graffiti can be tough to remove, sometimes requiring sanding down the surface, and often leaves permanent discoloration.

“Most of the graffiti is very light scratching, and you can remove that really easy. But paint graffiti is unusual — and a lot of paint graffiti, and there was quite a bit of it, is really unusual,” Ms. Mathis told The Times-Independent of Moab, Utah.

The graffiti was not the only violation of park rules that Ms. Mathis saw during her visit. She told the newspaper that she also saw discarded toilet paper and a dog, even though dogs are prohibited on all trails at Arches National Park.