Dave Stevenson has been making snow for 22 years, the past 17 years at the Red River Ski Area. He originally came to town from Wyoming, where he worked with Mike Van Ormer, who left a small family-owned ski area in Wyoming (Snowy Ridge outside Laramie) to become Operational Manager at RRSA. That was in 1986.
Ironically, a recent motorcycle accident on the highway in nearby Questa will require former motorcycle road racer "Super Dave" to stay off his feet for the next 12 weeks. Since he couldn't run away from our interviewer, the Miner thought the time was right to pick his brain about snowmaking and grooming.
"When I first started in 80-81, the equipment was pretty much the same style of equipment we use today, only a bit more archaic. The principles are the same."
"First, you blow water into the air and wait for it to freeze before it falls to the ground. You use several different things to help it along. Big ski areas use air and water systems, with lines for both running up the hill. They have big noisy guns that mix compressed air and water, which mix well together and expand, freezing quickly. It's pretty expensive, though, because you have to run the air (120 lbs psi) and water (400-600 lbs psi) under high compression."
"Red River used to have a system like that years ago. We switched over to an airless system. We only have to run electricity (to power the snow guns) and water. It's cost effective and it does the job well. Each snowgun has its own on-board compressor. We spray bulk water into the air that isn't mixed with compressed air, then mix water and compressed air with it. That works just like the old big air guns, the compressed air expands and freezes almost immediately, about 8-12 inches from the gun. It mixes with the bulk water and a fan blows it high into the air where the water molecules attach to an already frozen 'nucleus.'"
"In order for water to freeze and form a crystal there must be a nucleus. Nature does it with dust particles or volcanic ash. We do it with a nucleus of compressed air and water. Air temperature needs to be around 28-30 degrees, which is cold enough to allow us to lay down a good base layer. You can blow to 10-15 below, but things freeze up. It's tricky."
"The snow we make is real snow. The crystals are generally a little bit bigger (than Mother Nature's) because of the water droplets we use. It's a lot more durable, too, standing up to daily skiing and grooming longer."
"Natural snow is nice. Everyone likes fresh powder. After natural snow is groomed for 2 or 3 days, it becomes about the same consistency as man-made snow. The crystal structure breaks down when the air is beat out of it."
"We try to have all the snow made by the end of December, sometimes into January. That's when the nights start getting too warm to make snow on a regular basis. Temperature inversions can slow us down, too. That's when I like to do snow grooming. Grooming packs fresh snow and also performs tilling which smoothes out the ruts and bumps that develop during the day. Everybody likes that fresh, corduroy snow on the intermediate runs every morning."