The Salt Lake City Tribune has published some rather disheartening predictions for 2015’s Speed Week at the Bonneville Salt Flats. While no official word on the fate of the event has been made public as of yet, the article cites several glaring issues that could put the kibosh on this year’s high-speed runs.

Image: Salt Lake Tribune

More than 60 entrants in the event should be conducting test and tune passes on the salt this week, but instead they’ve had to pack up and head home, as there’s simply not enough salt on the flats to safely run passes at this time. If the event ends up being canceled, it will be for the second year in a row.

According to the Tribune the cause for issues varies depending on who you ask, either too much water or not enough salt, but weather and environmental impact of local mining operations are key factors in most debates.

“I was actually out there for the past three or four days,” Russ Eyers, a member of the timing association, said last Thursday. “I was doing the surveying and grading, trying to find a place to hold a meet, and we just didn’t get there.”

Along with heavy rains last year that covered much of the flats in mud, salt depletion from those nearby mining operations has brought the salt crust from a depth of two to three feet thick during the heyday of the event in the 1940s and 50s, to just a few inches in some spots. Stay tuned for an official announcement about the event.

Image: Salt Lake Tribune