The mystery of the Utah monolith continues.
Photographer Ross Bernards shared on social media that he saw four men dismantle the silver object that was hidden in Moab, Utah. Bernards said he was photographing the monolith with friends on the night of Friday, November 27, when the men pushed the piece over. The men didn't identify themselves.
In an Instagram post, Bernards wrote:
"(The men) gave a couple of pushes on the monolith and one of them said 'You better have got your pictures.' He then gave it a big push, and it went over, leaning to one side. He yelled back to his other friends that they didn’t need the tools. The other guy with him at the monolith then said 'this is why you don’t leave trash in the desert.' Then all four of them came up and pushed it almost to the ground on one side, before they decided push it back the other when it then popped out and landed on the ground with a loud bang. They quickly broke it apart and as they were carrying to the wheelbarrow that they had brought one of them looked back at us all and said 'Leave no trace.' That was at 8:48."
The Bureau of Land Management confirmed that the monolith was taken down on Friday but didn't say by who.
The Utah monolith inspired someone in Romania to build one in the southeastern European country, Reuters reported. It appeared two weeks ago, but it disappeared overnight.
“An unidentified person, apparently a bad local welder, made it ... now all that remains is just a small hole covered by rocky soil,” Romanian journalist Robert Iosub said.
Photo: Utah Highway Patrol