Ski Resorts

SALT LAKE CITY -- Early-season snow has created prime avalanche conditions in many parts of the West, with one death already reported and another skier injured over the weekend in Utah.

At least 18 human-triggered slides have been recorded in Utah this month, according to the Utah Avalanche Center. In Colorado, 50 slides already have been reported this season, and officials estimated the actual number could be 10 times higher.

PARK CITY -  Utah’s congressional delegation introduced legislation Thursday to sell a corridor of national forest land for a gondola that would connect a Park City ski resort with another nearby resort.

SALT LAKE CITY -- A world record-holding professional skier who once famously jumped off a 255-foot cliff jump died in a weekend avalanche in Utah while on a steep slope at a closed resort.

Jamie Pierre, 38, was swept over a cliff Sunday at Snowbird Ski and Summer Resort in the Wasatch mountains about 30 miles southeast of Salt Lake City.

Pierre was snowboarding one of Snowbird's steepest slopes with a friend when he was sent cart-wheeling over a cliff after he triggered the late afternoon slide, the Utah Avalanche Center reported.

It was the season's first avalanche fatality in the U.S., authorities said.

COPPER MOUNTAIN, Colo. -- Just two weeks before its scheduled opening, the winding downhill course remains mostly covered in mud with hints of scrub brush poking through the only traces of snow in sight.

In years past, it would have taken a blizzard for this slope to have a shot at being skiable anytime soon.

Only, this isn't any year and this isn't any trail.

The U.S. Ski Team has invested millions to partner with Copper Mountain and launch its own training run at the resort from Nov. 1 to Dec. 10. There are 87 automated snowmaking guns on standby, prepared to work around the clock to blanket the nearly two-mile course and guarantee Olympic gold medalists such as Lindsey Vonn, Julia Mancuso, Bode Miller and Ted Ligety an early base of solid snow under their skis.

SALT LAKE CITY -- A proposal to link two Utah ski resorts with a series of ski lifts that cross the spine of the Wasatch Mountains has drawn criticism from environmental groups and Salt Lake City officials concerned about the impacts on the watershed.