The Quad Cities may not have a White Christmas this year but there will still be snow at one seasonal destination.
Ski Snowstar started making snow early Friday morning to get ready for the 2016 season.
Workers at the winter park said they normally try to have the place up and running by the time kids are out of school on winter break, but this year because of the warmer weather, they've been forced to push back some of the snow making process.
"We originally planned to open [December] 10th," said Joel Bowman, partial owner at Ski Snowstar. "Hopefully we can open [December] 31st but if we have good temps we're hoping to open as soon as possible."
For the next week, workers at Ski Snowstar will be working around the clock to make enough snow to cover all 28 acres of land.
They use 36 different snow guns to make the snow. In order to make the snow, it needs to be at least in the mid-twenties outside.
The snow guns make snow by mixing water with air, breaking the water into small particles; cooling the water by causing them to move through cold air and then forming a nucleus, a tiny snow crystal. Once the snowflakes are created, the snow guns blow them out over the slopes.
A lot of the process depends on the air's humidity and temperature. Cold dry air is much better for snow-making conditions than cold wet air. The lower the humidity, the more snow a system can produce at a given temperature.
Workers will typically spend around 500 hours per year making snow at Ski Snowstar and then spend countless hours grooming the snow.
"Once we get big piles built up we'll bring the groomers out and we'll start pushing piles, tying in runs, so we can spread them out for the ski-able surface," Bowman said. "We'll start building train park features for the train park riders, focus heavily on the teaching hill, obviously opening the tube hill as soon as we possibly can."
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