DEMING, Wash. — Mt. Baker Ski Area’s annual snowboarding competition, the 36th Legendary Bank Slalom, has been canceled due to a lack of snow.
This year’s El Niño winter is bringing warmer weather conditions and rain to an area reliant on snow and freezing temperatures. This natural warming of the Pacific Ocean along the equator is a rapidly developing climate pattern that typically occurs every two to seven years.
In a video on Wednesday, Mt. Baker Ski Area CEO Gwyn Howat outlined the snow base issues that "washed" this year's event into 2025.
Howat says the ski area lost approximately 14 inches of snow base since Sunday, Jan. 28. An atmospheric river that pummeled the Pacific Northwest brought at least five inches of rain to the ski area, Howat added.
“We’re not seeing the shot of snow to get enough snow back to heal what we’ve lost and actually have enough to be able to run a fair and a fun event,” Howat said.
The contest is typically held over Super Bowl weekend and was scheduled for next weekend, Feb. 9-11. Now, it will take place Feb. 7-9, 2025.
It started in 1985 and is considered one of the oldest banked slalom events in the snowboarding world. The first event organizers were retailer Bob Barci and Tom Sims, the founder of Sims Snowboards, according to Mt. Baker’s website. A banked slalom event was dreamed up for Mt. Baker due to its natural halfpipe.
The banked slalom has been canceled before, and come back stronger, Howat said. When the race was cancelled in 2005, the following year saw 800 inches of snowfall. In 2015 when the contest was canceled, the winter of 2016 saw 600 inches of snow, she said.
“In the bigger picture of the mountain, that’s also what we’re looking towards,” Howat said.
