Witnesses:
The Honorable Jonathan B. Jarvis
Director of National Park Service
The Honorable Greg Bryan
Mayor of Town of Tusayan
Ms. Anna Eberly
Managing Director, Claude Moore Colonial Farm. McLean, Virginia
Mr. Myron Ebell
Director, Center for Energy and Environment, Competitive Enterprise Institute
Ms. Lisa Simon

The government shutdown from October 1 through October 17 caused a delay in the delivery of a Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton scheduled to be revealed at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History on National Fossil Day,  October 16, 2013. The fossil, discovered in Montana, is one of the most complete T. rex skeletons ever recovered and was meant to be the main attraction at the annual Earth Science Week event. The Army Corps of Engineers was unable to transport the nearly 80% complete fossil  because key staff were furloughed.

On October 16, the House Natural Resources Committee and the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee held a joint oversight hearing entitled As Difficult As Possible: The National Park Service’s (NPS) Implementation of the Government Shutdown. The hearing examined the actions taken by the NPS following the government shutdown, which began on October 1 due to a lapse in fiscal year (FY) 2014 appropriations.

The House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology postponed all hearings during the government shutdown. Additionally, other committees were unable to hold hearings because so many furloughed federal employees were unable to testify during the partial shutdown.

Due to a lapse in fiscal year (FY) 2014 appropriations, the government underwent a partial shutdown from October 1 to October 16 until Democrats and Republicans were finally able to pass bipartisan legislation to temporarily reopen the government.