A TikTok influencer has been given a fine after sharing a stunt at the Grand Canyon on her social media.
On October 26, 20-year-old Katie Sigmond posted a now-deleted video of herself hitting a golf ball and throwing a golf club into the edge of the Grand Canyon’s South Rim.
One day later, the Grand Canyon National Park took to their social media page to react to her clip and write: "Do we really need to say, 'don’t hit golf balls into the Grand Canyon?'"
The content creator - who has more than 832.8K followers on the video-sharing app - immediately drew anger from online users and quickly went viral for all the wrong reasons.
Read Grand Canyon National Park's post below:After receiving reports about the incident, Grand Canyon law enforcement, the National Park Service, and the U.S. Forest Service gave Sigmond a $285 fine, federal violation notices, and charged her with three misdemeanor offenses, per Insider.
The publication revealed that the fine was related to two Class B misdemeanor charges: Disorderly conduct, and tossing/throwing items into the canyon.
In addition to this, the Central Violations Bureau of the Administrative Office of the US Courts stated that they received two payments from the TikToker on November 15, a month after the incident.
Joelle Baird, a public affairs specialist for the national park, told the outlet that they contacted Sigmond first after the viral video, and she confessed to hitting the items.
They explained that her three Class B misdemeanor charges are due to her "creating hazardous conditions, littering, throwing the objects themselves".
The specialist explained that each order could mean a fine of up to $1,000, however, it has not even been revealed whether her third charge has been settled or is still ongoing.
Baird added that a collateral citation was sent to the TikToker's home shortly after, but, because she chose to pay the fine - the case was handled outside of court.
There are regulations and rules around the dumping of litter and other objects in national parks, with penalties including fines or jail time, Newsweek stated.
Not littering benefits the wildlife as the Grand Canyon - which measures a mile in depth, 278 miles in length, and 18 miles in width - hosts 91 mammal species, 58 reptiles, and amphibians, 18 fish as well as 1,443 invertebrates, per the outlet.
According to the media report, some of the animals can only be found in the park and garbage left behind can lead to them being less cautious around people and also polluting the soil and rivers.
Furthermore, the National Park Service has cautioned people that tossing items can also hurt hikers below and lead to landslides.
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