SNOWSHOE, W.Va.— The winter storm that brought snow and ice beginning Sunday leading into Monday has helped a couple of snow resorts in the mountain state.
During the storm, Snowshoe Mountain Ski Resort in Pocahontas County, received 20 inches of snow.
Shawn Cassell, Marketing Director for the resort says that receiving snow significantly helps the resort.
It’s getting deep up here y’all! Another 10″ of upslope Cheat Mtn Magic brings us to 41″ in the last 7 days, and 109″ on the season. Another storm is expected Friday night into Saturday. Come on up and climb aboard the powder train while it’s rolling!#snowshoemtn #skiwv#wvwx pic.twitter.com/2AHjMVQda1
— snowshoemtn (@snowshoemtn) January 9, 2025
“It’s definitely good for us, it helps us get more trails open, the ski conditions are much better when we have the natural snow,” Cassell said. “I think it also just, when it’s snowing in the metro areas and stuff where our guests typically come from it gets folks excited and gets them wanting to go and see more snow and go skiing.”
Josh Faber, General Manager at Winterplace Ski Resort in Raleigh County, agreed that it helps resorts. With this past storm they also received 20 inches of snow.
He said, for him, the number one thing it helps with is getting it out there that there is snow on the ground.
“Number one helping point from it is actually just awareness for people to see snow in their yards and to be winter outside to think about skiing and snowboarding and tubing,” Faber said.
And while the snow helps them, there are some downfalls when receiving a winter storm that was accompanied by snow and ice.
For Cassell, the roads were that downfall.
“The road conditions, getting to the mountain is always the catch 22 there, but our road crews here in West Virginia do a really great job, especially here in Pocahontas County,” he said. “And our crews here in Snowshoe do a really great job as well.”
While it effected the roads for Snowshoe, at Winterplace they closed down early on Sunday and didn’t open back up the next day.
“Unfortunately, the next morning, Monday morning, we did lose power, so we were closed because we didn’t have power,” Faber said. “We did get power back Monday afternoon, but then we had to, go through every single chairlift and get everything unfrozen and safe and operational.”
He says that since then, everything has been running smoothly.
The only thing that the ice impacted for Snowshoe was three of their lifts.
“A little bit of a glaze on things on Monday and for our detachable lifts, that three of our 13 total lifts, our high-speed detachable lifts, when you get some ice on the cables on those it does sometimes delay those,” Cassell said.
However, he said that they were able to get two of those three working Monday afternoon.
Both resorts did have a little bit of preparing to do before the storm hit.
Cassell said that the groundskeepers made sure that all of their equipment was ready, not just for this bought of snow but for all of the snow that comes after it as well.
“Just making sure that their equipment and all that they need is ready to go, that’s the biggest thing they can do to prepare, is making sure people are scheduled and equipment’s ready and that we’re just keeping it going,” he said. “I know those guys; it’s been a never-ending job all week of removing snow.”
While Winterplace didn’t do as much to prepare for the snowstorm, Faber said that they are using the snow as an opportunity.
“Try to get more terrain open and MLK weekend is coming fast, so we want to get this place 100% open,” he said.