Desert rock formations popular with tourists toppled amid heavy rain and floods

Two famous rock formations that long attracted tourists and photographers to a remote part of New Mexico in the US have collapsed.

The Alien Throne and the nearby King of Wings were brought down in recent weeks by the very forces of nature responsible for sculpting them.

Record rainfall in north-western New Mexico and adjacent parts of Arizona, Colorado and Utah caused flooding, damaged homes and eroded the landscape.

Outdoor enthusiasts have been sharing photos online of the otherworldly forms and saying they felt fortunate to have seen them before they collapsed.

The rock formations involved hefty planks of rock that seemed to defy gravity as they balanced on top of spindly pedestals of clay, while some columns of sandstone had the appearance of lace, elaborately eroded by the seasons.

Tour guide Kialo Winters shares this piece of his homeland on the edge of the Ah-Shi-Sle-Pah Wilderness with visitors regularly.

On a recent Friday afternoon, the founder of Navajo Tours USA rounded a bend and found one of the area’s most famous features had collapsed.

His heart dropped as he found the Alien Throne was no more.

“It was surreal,” he told the Associated Press. “I had to sort of just pause. A lot of things ran through my head.”

The Alien Throne and the nearby King of Wings formation collapsed within weeks of each other as the south-western US endured major rounds of storms over recent weeks, with rain falling on ground already soaked from an especially wet autumn.

The water is receding and a clean-up is under way, but officials estimate the damage could stretch into the hundreds of millions of dollars.