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Backstory: The snowmakers of New England ski country
Armed with 'Wizzards' and the laws of chemistry, snowmakers at New England resorts toil to create the 'perfect' snow.
By Cynthia Anderson | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitorfrom the March 14, 2007 edition
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STRATTON, VT. - At 4:00 p.m., as the day's last skiers make their way off the slopes, veteran snowmaker Lynn "Cape" Capen is gearing up. In a work area warmed by three behemoth compressors and two active puppies, he plots logistics for the upcoming US Open in snowboarding. He's already covered the Sun Bowl with plenty of "dry snowball," but the Suntanner run, where the Big Air will take place, still needs more, as do Upper Standard and Rimeline.
Soon Mr. Capen and members of his 30-person crew will fan out over the Stratton Mountain resort on snowmobiles, dragging hoses and snow guns. With tools from packs strapped to their chests, they'll fit the hoses to hydrants installed on the hillside. Then, assuming nothing essential is broken or frozen or just making trouble, they'll turn everything on. Before long there will be snow – great, noisy plumes of it arcing from the guns and accumulating on the ground in the gathering dark.
Although Capen and the guys are a little too gritty and real-life to be likened to elves as they make their way over the mountain, what they do is something like magic. Indeed, in a time when natural snowfall is unpredictable at best, ski resorts across New England depend on their snowmakers to keep the slopes white and the bottom line black.
Vermonter Dave Lacombe, who bears the title of "snow surfaces manager" at the Killington resort, sends members of his 65-person team out each night with crampons and miners' lights. At Wachusett Mountain in Princeton, Mass., one of the region's busiest ski areas, Mike Hayward leads a crew of 18 snowmakers in what's jokingly referred to as "The Department of Mother Nature."
"Snowmakers are the gas in the tank of the Lamborghini," says Alex Kaufman, a staffer at Sunday River in Bethel, Maine. "Without them, skiing in New England would be fundamentally different."
Different, for sure, and possibly nonexistent: Of the 2-to-4-foot snow base most New England resorts accumulate by midwinter, almost all is man-made. And the quality of the fake snow has become a source of considerable braggadocio among resorts – a game played with the laws of chemistry and spin.
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