The ski season in Ruka, Kuusamo, took a record breaking early start on Friday 6th of October at 9.30am. The previous record had been made in Ruka in 1994 when the season started on the 7th of October. In honour of the celebration year, Ruka offered one lucky one the chance to open Finland’s official ski season.
Ruka’s ski season opening is no longer completely dependent upon weather conditions the way it was two and 23 years ago. In summer 2016, a new kind of snow storing technique was tested for the first time in Finland at Ruka and the season successfully started on the 10th of October last autumn.
During this summer, snow has been stored in two slopes and the season was kicked off in Saarua on Friday morning as planned.
– Last winter’s feedback showed that the stock snow slope had been worthwhile and our customers have reacted especially well to the fact that we are now able to announce the next ski season’s opening day already in the spring. We are no longer guessing or at the mercy of the weather conditions, sums up Ruka Ski Resort’s Operational Director Matti Parviainen.
Ruka is one of the Europe’s most snow guaranteed ski resorts, whose secret lies within both the optimal climate and the first class snow making equipment and snow-how. The ski season in Ruka continues all the way until the 5th of May, which equals up to 213 skiing days during the season.
– During the summer we installed new lighting to Saarua 12 slope, which opened on Friday, and an automatic snow making system, which means that in the future, the stock snow slope’s snow will be produced more energy efficiently than before during the cold temperatures in January and February, states Parviainen.
In July, there was enough of Ruka’s stock snow to be handed over to Ranua’s polar bears. This time the snowy present was given to one family mother from city of Oulu. At the season opening, Ruka arranged a competition where Marjo Korva from Oulu, from amongst the other 4000 participants, won the chance to officially open Finland’s ski season.
Photos and videos from the Ruka’s season opening and the making of the stock snow slopes: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0Bw0iAvAiVOLuNlloT0s3RWtxNFE
Information on Ruka’s snow reliability: http://ski.ruka.fi/en/snowguarantee
Slope and ski lift information: http://ski.ruka.fi/en/slopes
More information: producer Jussi Väätäinen, phone: +358 45 120 9920, email: [email protected]
Rukakeskus Corporation is family business, which has been in charge of slope operations of Ruka Ski Resort since 1973 and Pyhä Ski Resort since 1987. It’s one of the leading tourism companies in Finland and one of the market leaders in ski resort industry with nearly 20% share of ski pass sales. The companies operate in international and year-round tourism centres. Our core competence is slope business but we also operate in accommodation, rental shop and store businesses in both Ruka and Pyhä. Our turnover is approx. EUR 25 million and we employ about 160 people.
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