Holiday Valley To Start Making Snow On Friday

The temperatures are dropping and that means it's time for Holiday Valley to fire up the snowguns in anticipation of the 2017-18 winter season. According to Steve Crowley, Director of Mountain Operations, "With Friday's predicted low temperatures in the teens and highs only in the low 20's, it's the perfect scenario to start up our snowmaking system. We look for at least a 24 hour period of cold and we expect to be able to make snow starting Friday morning and possibly into Saturday."

Taking advantage of their automated snowmaking system, the Holiday Valley crew will be able to run snowguns on five or more slopes – Yodeler, Mardi Gras, School Haus, Punch Bowl and Cindy's. In addition, they will be test firing the new automated guns that were installed this summer on several other slopes. The advantage of an automated snowmaking system where the guns are computer controlled in a central location is that the guns can fire up all at the same time, without having to manually travel to each location to turn them on or off. The system is also energy efficient and able to adapt to changes in temperature and humidity.

Sunday is expected to turn warmer, so the resort will create mounds of manmade snow this week to preserve them until snowmaking can restart with the next cold snap. Holiday Valley plans to open on Friday, November 24, weather permitting. Ideally Mother Nature will contribute to the effort, but Crowley estimates they'll need to build up about a 12 inch base of manmade snow on the slopes.