Not even halfway through the current ski season, Wachusett Mountain Ski Area has broken its personal snowmaking record.
In its first season after a $2-million expansion that more than doubled water pumping capacity, the resort has built an average base depth of four feet of snow, despite only receiving 40 inches of natural snow so far this winter. Wachusett has already turned more than 95 million gallons of water into snow, a figure it usually reaches over the course of an entire season, said resort President Jeff Crowley.
Last summer, Wachusett expanded its water pumping capacity from roughly 4,000 gallons per minute to 8,000, in order to weatherproof its business model as much as possible. The advantage of man-made snow is that it sticks around longer than natural snow and can withstand environmental fluctuations like rain storms, Crowley said.
“Even when the natural snow melts in people’s backyards, we’ve been able to maintain a solid base,” he said.
