Rockslide crashes wedding ceremony in southern Utah
Originally Published: 30 MAR 26 14:56 ET
By Arianne Brown, KSL
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IVINS, Washington County, Utah (KSL) -- A couple had an unexpected visitor at their elopement ceremony on Saturday.
The couple was visiting from out of state for a picturesque "secret elopement" when a rockslide occurred. The moment was captured by Shane Schieve, who said they initially thought it was a low-flying jet because it was so loud.
"It was at 6:01 p.m. (at the) top of the Veterans Home Street in Ivins," Schieve told KSL. "They were using my car for the wedding photos, and they were almost done with the ceremony when it happened. It just sounded like thunder and we looked up ... and saw the dust and rocks falling down the mountain. Talk about a wedding crasher!"
The couple's wedding photographer, Lois Valdez, also took photos and video of the event. She said it felt surreal, but also "a little wild in the best way."
"We were in the middle of the ring exchange," Valdez said. "Everything was super quiet, intimate and low-key, since it was a secret elopement. And then out of nowhere, we see part of the red rock start sliding down the mountain."
Valdez said the moment was made even stranger when, just before the rocks came tumbling down, the officiant gave the couple some advice that may or may not have foreshadowed the impending event.
"What made it even crazier was that right before it happened, the officiant had been talking about the mountains," Valdez said.
The officiant's words were shared with KSL by the bride. In his address to the couple, the officiant spoke about the native lands where the ceremony was taking place, saying in part, "In the spirit of the love and commitment we celebrate today, we offer our gratitude for the land itself and our respect to the Paiute people —past, present and emerging."
"The timing just made sense," Valdez said. "It turned this calm, private moment, into something loud, unexpected and honestly kind of exciting. ... On top of that, we saw turtles out there, too, which just added to the whole feeling. That day was just magical and meant to be. ... It was perfect."
The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by KSL's editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.
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