Mountain Update: January 27, 2012

At the end of a challenging day, I wanted to give everyone the insider’s look at what we’ve faced today and an update on our action plan and focus heading into the weekend.

After the herculean effort of de-icing and chipping the lifts, we’re confident that skiing and riding conditions for this weekend will be back to what you’ve come to expect from us here at Stratton. While icing was a huge challenge today, it actually helped protect the snow surface. Groomers will be out tonight and we expect a nice weekend ahead.

What our lifties had to contend with...

We received two inches of snow early last night before it quickly changed over to mixed precipitation and then freezing rain. This morning, the mountain was encased in ice with a few tenths of an inch on the lower mountain and 1.5 to 2 inches on the upper mountain. Early this morning we groomed the lower mountain trails out of the main base while our lift crews worked to de-ice the lower mountain chair lifts. We got AMEX clear by 7:45 and opened without delay. Our crew moved on to each Lower Mountain Lift, starting with Villager and Tamarack before heading to Sun Bowl and the Upper Mtn in preparation for this weekend’s operation.





Ain't no rain getting through that.

With the lower mountain open, we shifted our focus to preparing for Saturday operations. Although the ice is a huge menace for our lifts crews as they must climb each and every tower to chip sheave wheels to free the tower assemblies in order for the haul rope to move (no small task and one that will take hours per lift), it’s actually a blessing for our snow surface as it creates a layer of insulation that sheds the water off the surface. For that reason, we’re staying off the majority of our trails until the rain passes later tonight.

Thanks for bearing with us today as we work our way through these challenges and we look forward to seeing you on the mountain this weekend.

Mike

VP of Operations