Lack of snow plays havoc with Western US ski resorts

This year''s early Thanksgiving has pushed the skiing season''s traditional start date a week ahead of normal. But, there''s no snow to ski on! While a few of the more well-heeled resorts are resorting to manufactured snow to cater to the holiday weekend, most of the western USA''s winter ski resorts face an uncertain start to the season.

A few storms earlier this week dropped significant snow in parts of the Cascades and up to nine inches on Colorado''s Rockies, but most of the US ski country has yet to see major snowfall. To compound matters, little snow is expected on the weekend, setting a dry note for the US $6 billion-a-year ski industry.

But snowmaking machines are doing better business than ever before. However, there''s a limit to how many artificial snow slopes can be created (quite apart from the cost).

For example, of the seven resorts that comprise the Ski Lake Tahoe alliance, the leading location for the California and Nevada ski industry, just two are opening this weekend. In Utah, location of the last Winter Olympics held in the US, only one of the state''s 13 resorts was open before Thanksgiving.

The others are working quite diligently to manufacture snow. Snowmaking technology has greatly improved with the advent of airless snowmaking nozzles that convert less water into more, higher-quality snow, faster.

The culprit is identified as this year''s ''Indian summer'', combined with the La Niña climate pattern. The phenomenon, caused by a cooling of the waters of the eastern Pacific Ocean, usually means a colder, wetter winter in the Pacific Northwest, but a warmer and drier season across the southern US, including the ski paradise states, Utah and New Mexico.

At Mammoth Mountain in California''s southern Sierra, only one of 26 ski lifts is open. In Colorado, Beaver Creek delayed Wednesday''s planned opening until Friday. Steamboat Springs, Colorado''s snowiest destination has put off its opening by a week, its second delayed opening in 27 years.

Mount Hood''s Timberline ski area was the first to open in Oregon, after last weekend''s snowfall of nearly two feet. Other resorts are using snow guns to manufacture snow around the clock.