Francovich: Strong winter start, followed by warm weather, highlights the unpredictability of the ski industry

In early January, area ski hills were flush, riding high on a meteorological winning streak.

Up to that point Spokane International Airport had recorded more than 30 inches of snow, making that early snowpack the ninth highest out of the last 41 years measured on Jan. 4.

It was cold. It was snowing. Spokane felt like a true mountain town and, as anyone who works in the ski industry knows, when it snows in town people flock to area hills.

Fast forward ten days to Jan. 14 when the average temperature in Spokane hit, wait for it, 40 degrees.

“(That’s) the ebb and flow of temperature,” said Jim Van Löben Sels, the general manager of Mt. Spokane Ski and Snowboard Park. “We had two days of rain where we actually had 1.5 inches of rain and we had a lake in the middle of the learning area. We had a (snow) cat actually sink in. And then the next night it snowed 15 inches and everything disappeared.”

Welcome to the inconstancy of the ski industry.

“You just don’t know what you’re going to get,” Van Löben Sels said.

As a former winery manager he’s accepted the fact that, at the end of the day, Mother Nature holds all the cards.

“Is it nerve-wracking when you see three or four days of above freezing temps,” he said. “Yes. But you just have to roll with it.”

That uncertainty has long been a reality of the ski industry, and skiers and resorts around the world have tried in various ways to fix the game in their favor. In the 1930s ski areas started using shaved ice, and in 1934 the Toronto Ski Club hauled in 75 tons of the stuff in an effort to cover the run up and landing of a jump in anticipation of an upcoming competition, according to the New England Ski museum.

In the following decades resorts began experimenting with snow-making machines, a process by which water is turned into snow and blown onto the mountain. Now, 17% of skiable terrain in the United States, including at 49 Degrees North, features human-made snow, according to the National Ski Areas Association.

“The need for snow-making became clear when skiing became a commercial enterprise during the big recreational boom after World War II,” Seth Masia, president of the International Skiing History Association told the Smithsonian this month. “Particularly at low-elevation ski areas in the East, they just didn’t get enough natural snow to do business at the levels that were necessary when skiing became so popular in the postwar years.”

Other resorts, particularly in Canada and Europe, have practiced snow farming - a process by which resorts save or stockpile snow.

In Europe, for example, resorts have begun covering snow with tarps in the spring in hopes that it lasts through the summer and establishes a strong base for the next winter, according to a 2018 Bloomberg article. In Canada, high-altitude resorts such as Sunshine Village Ski Resort have installed miles of fencing to catch windblown snow, then redistributing that collected snow. At least two resorts in Colorado also employ this practice, according to the Smithsonian article.

In 2021, 49 Degrees North installed snow-making machines, which allows the resort to begin building a base layer earlier in the season, said Rick Brown, the director of skier and rider services. Those machines don’t eliminate the element of chance but do increase the odds in favor of the resort, he said.

“Many of us refer to ourselves as snow farmers. It is like the agricultural industry - you don’t necessarily have control over all the factors,” he said. “You kind of have to take what you’re given and do your best to prepare.”

Mt Spokane has opted not to invest in snow making equipment, Van Löben Sels said, instead investing in chairlifts and buildings.

“Mother Nature is going to give us what we need when we need it,” he said. “And if we have a late start, we have a late start.”

Of course, Mother Nature may not provide the white stuff so often, or at all, if climate change models predicting a 50% reduction in winter season lengths by 2050 prove accurate. A possible reality that could force resorts to farm snow even more aggressively, Brown said.

“With global warming it’s certainly possible,” he said of the techniques employed in the Europe.

For now this winter has, despite the warm up, delivered the goods, Brown said. Snow coverage is excellent and the solid base laid down by the early storms will, barring weekslong warm stretches, carry the resort through the season.

In fact, right now the biggest concern for Brown is how the weather impacts skiers’ and boarders’ perception of conditions.

“I don’t want to say we don’t stress. It’s definitely stressful at times,” he said.” But for us, so far this season, if I’m really honest, the stress is more how is the weather going to impact visitation.”