Winter Takes Hold in the Mountains of West Virginia

Greetings (Update 1.18.08) –

As skiers, snowboarders and snowtubers make plans to head to West Virginia Ski Resorts for the holiday weekend, fresh snow and cold temperatures will greet them at all of the resorts. Officials with the National Weather Service in Charleston, West Virginia reports that up to nearly two-feet of snow has fallen in some spots in the higher elevations this week.  More snow is expected this weekend at all of the resorts.  

The January snowfall is providing awesome conditions at all of the West Virginia Ski Resorts. Along with the natural snowfall has come cold temperatures, as the thermometer is expected to drop into the single digits in Tucker and Pocahontas County where Canaan Valley, Timberline and Snowshoe Mountain Resorts are located this weekend. In Ohio County, the home of Oglebay and in Raleigh County, Winterplace’s location, temperatures are going to be in the teens. The cold temperatures will allow all of the resorts’ snowguns to operate around the clock, which is vital to open additional skiing and snowboarding terrain for visitors coming in from the various mid-Atlantic and southeast states.

West Virginia ski areas continue to provide the most open terrain in the region with over 90 trails open on Friday, January 18. The resort’s snowmakers will use the cold temperatures to create manmade blizzards, producing 20,000 tons of snow per hour when the temperature drops into the teens (when combining all five resort’s snowmaking efforts at once), that’s enough snow to cover 20 football fields with a foot of snow each hour. This week’s natural snowfall will also benefit the various Nordic areas that offer cross-country and snowshoeing to visitors to the mountains of West Virginia.

All of the resorts are planning special Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend events so check out the resorts various websites for all of the details.