Many ski areas finish with record-breaking seasons

By Scott Sandsberry | Yakima Herald-Republic • Published May 21, 2008

Ski areas throughout the Northwest had such great snow in the 2007-08 winter that neither its November absence nor its road-closing, midwinter surplus could prevent a banner year for the winter-sports industry.

Several resorts - including the Summit at Snoqualmie - set new highs in skier/snowboarder visits and others, like White Pass, had seasons that ranked among their all-time best.

Snoqualmie's total of 714,000 user visits through April 30 already was more than 100,000 higher than its previous best winter. Washington's 49 Degrees North and Oregon's Mount Hood Meadows both set all-time records for skier visits, and White Pass had one of its top five years, with about 130,600 visits.

In all, Washington ski resorts will finish with about 2.1 million visits, about 50,000 off the record winter of 2001-02.

'No November'

"These numbers are remarkable, because we had no November," said Scott Kaden, president of Pacific Northwest Ski Areas Association. "Some ski areas had to wait two weeks into December to get open, and some even had to wait three or four weeks.

"In order to get a record, you almost have to be open in November; those November numbers are very hard to recoup over the course of a season," he said.

Only one Washington ski area, Mission Ridge, was able to open for Thanksgiving, and it was open for one weekend. White Pass had the same kind of suspended anticipation - opening for the Dec. 1- 2 weekend, then powering down the lifts until reopening Dec. 13.

Blocked passes

By mid-December, most resorts were open and the snow just kept coming - so much, in fact, that even the diligent snow-removal crews from the state Department of Transportation couldn't always keep up with the deluge.

"Snoqualmie had seven days of lost operation in the heart of the season, and White Pass lost four days because Highway 12 was closed," Kaden said. "There were days when Stevens, Snoqualmie Pass and White were all closed - there was no east-west traffic in the entire state of Washington, and yet these (resorts) did exceptionally well, given the circumstances."