It is crazy that this was the closing weekend for BRIGHTON because the resort is still covered in snow. In the past 24 days the COTTONWOOD CANYONS were hit with just around 200 inches…..that’s 16 feet!!!! The natural terrain is as good as if it was the dead of winter and the park is still one of the most fun cruising parks around. There is really no better way to close it down for the season than laps in the park, burgers, tons of NATURAL LIGHT and BIKINIS. Lift tickets for Saturday were 29.00 if you dressed in beach attire. This deal made from some awesome people watching!!! Pretty sure that a lot of people got one hell of a sun burn yesterday. 

 Levitation team rider AUSTEN GRANGER and our hommie B spent the day lapping the park and chilling at the BIKINI contest. AUSTEN has had a crazy schedule for the past few weeks traveling with the SIGNAL team and was only in town for the day but still found time to make it up to BRIGHTON for one last session.

AUSTEN picking his stick for the day.

AUSTEN was throwing down some smooth NOSE PICKS on the wall 

AUSTEN smoothly making his way through the park

THE DUDES

After a long winter of shredding sometimes you have to switch it up a little. For AUSTEN and B switching it up meant taking some SNOW BIKES from a demo tent and sending it down the runs. This made the day a whole lot more entertaining. With in seconds AUSTEN and B were bombing down runs and their were a couple of violent wrecks that went down.

Having never been on a snow bike until 5 minutes ago AUSTEN was ripping!! It’s seriously ok to LAUGH….we were rolling!!

This was about 1 minute before B went down hard. Don’t worry the safety leash is attached to your wrist so the bike doesn’t go very far…..WTF?

If it was a style contest on the SNOW BIKES…. AUSTEN might of won.

B is no stranger to riding slush and parks after years of shredding in SO-CAL. He made the move out to Utah this year and we are pretty sure he’s staying. He had some smooth ROCK to FAKIE’s on the wall 

AND YES…..There was a BIKINI contest. It was a little scary in the crowd of people and we will spare you some shots of girls that SHOULD NOT be in BIKINIS but the girls in the actual contest were keeping all the drunk dudes in the crowd pretty stoked.

The contest was heavily sponsored by NATURAL LIGHT so all the BABES were chugging beer on the snowy runway. Pretty cool to see chicks in bikinis while your shredding and they are getting HAMMERED

They way it should be!!!

They even had  HOOLA HOOPS

ALL in all it was a great season at BRIGHTON and if you didn’t get a pass this year make sure to get one for next season. To find out more about BRIGHTON just CLICK HERE

TYLER ANDERSON slashing his way through one of the deepest days ever. 4/4/09 was hands down the deepest in bounds day of all time.

For twelve days straight Utah was absolutely pummeled with snow. Little Cottonwood Canyon received almost double the amount than the surrounding areas and Snowbird was ripping harder than ever. Every day just got deeper and deeper and  people kept claiming “best day of the season” with every day being better than the next. It started to seem like it would never end. It started to snow like some sort of legendary dream day you would read about or the old timers would talk about from 50 years ago. When it was all said and done THE BIRD received 144 inches of epic light pow.  THE LEVITATION PROJECT spent every day at the Bird documenting one of the most epic storm cycles. We stayed at the resort and were on the hill shooting by 6 am every morning. Whether it was the team destroying the mountain or Patrol blowing the place up…we got it!!!!

How pissed would you be if your job was to shovel the deck?

MITCH ALLEN even found time to get a few shots.

In just 7 minutes the Tram takes you up to HIDDEN PEAK which has an elevation of 11,000 feet  and you can take runs that are up to 2.5 miles to get to the bottom. There are very few mountains in the world that can compare when it’s that deep. Most mountains just get flatter and flatter but the Bird just keeps getting better.

TIM RONAN sends a BACK 3 over the Rothman snow fence into a field of pow

AUSTEN GRANGER waves hi to everyone staying at the CLIFF LODGE.

When the forecast calls for 12 inches of snow and the famous Utah LAKE EFFECT kicks in and doubles or triples the forecasted totals the SNOWBIRD SKI PATROL has their work cut out for them. The majority of pass holders take for granted what it takes for the patrol to get the mountain open. They have 2,500 acres of steep rugged terrain to get open for thousands of powder crazed people. During some of the deepest days of the cycle by 3 0′clock the Tram operator would announce “there are currently no run closures” and that is one hell of an accomplishment.  Big thanks to the entire patrol staff we were able to witness first hand what it takes to open the mountain in some of the most extreme situations.

So next time you see patrol after you just had one of the most epic runs of your life….tell them Thank you. They have one of the toughest jobs in the world and they do it because… they love it. There were a few days that the mountain sounded like a war zone and all you could here were people yelling “FIRE IN THE HOLE” with explosions going off all over the mountain. Without Patrol these days would not be possible.

Snowbird Patrol’s day starts dark and early in some pretty gnarly weather conditions.

After a morning briefing and weather report they load up their back packs with explosives and head out to start bombing the mountain.

Heading up to Baldy to start blasting away

Seth Underwood skiing a heavily windloaded zone.

Boom!!!! this is where Seth was standing 90 seconds ago

KABLAMMO!!!!!

Steve Miller getting the CIRQUE open

POW BANG!!!

STEVE MILLER enjoying the rewards of the job

JOHN-O gets paid to do this

GAME ON!!!! once  patrol finished their routes in the morning they  would start opening terrain and the slashing was insane every single day. During the 12 day pow bender the runs kept filling in through out the day. It was blowing sideways and just kept getting deeper. There were a few moments that it looked like the sun might come out but then another wave would come in and re-blanket the mountain.

TIM RONAN floats a massive front 3 into Dalton’s

Another day at the office for Nico

TYLER ANDERSON rallying down the CIRQUE

TIM RONAN and AUSTEN GRANGER catching their breath in between runs.

AUSTEN GRANGER floating his way into BLACK JACK gully

TYLER ANDERSON was pretty psyched on the soft landings

ZACH WATKINS floats an effortless Front 1 over ANDERSONS

AUSTEN GRANGER pops a delmar over the snow fence

TYLER ANDERSON boosting OTR

PHIL DAMIANAKES came out of nowhere and got a few shots in between shooting with the  Absinthe crew

Nico checking out the kit on “that chick”

ZACK WATKINS is somewhere in that cloud

TIM RONAN paddled out to some big SNOWBIRD sets

AUSTEN GRANGER putting in some overtime and helping by filming his own runs.

TIM RONAN bushwacking down chips

TYLER ANDERSON blasting through feet of UTAH’S cleanest uncut powder

seriously it was that deep!!!!. Every day was insane during the 12 day session but if you missed APRIL 4 you really blew it. The storm just kept nuking but the night of the 3rd LAKE EFFECT came back with a vengeance and dropped 40 inches on an already soft base. The wind drifts were chest deep and the entire mountain turned into a white ocean that you had to surf your way down.

Groomers were transformed into bottomless pow fields

If you have the means it is well worth throwing down for a room. Just get a bunch of homies to go in on it. The LITTLE COTTONWOOD road was closed in the mornings all week long and if you were up there you were the only ones on the hill. Waking up to the sound of avey bombs and the howitzer shooting the road is the best alarm clock on the planet. It is possible to have the whole mountain to your self for hours at a time before the road is open and the crowd starts showing up.

2,500 acres of bottomless pow and TYLER ANDERSON had it all to himself.

ZACK WATKINS taking a self filmed run in some deep ass snow

TIM RONAN kicking some snow off the trees in the amphitheater

After an epic day it’s time for a beer and a shot at the tram club or maybe 20. The TRAM CLUB has one of the best deals out of any resort in the world. You can get a beer and a shot for 5.00 and after a couple hours things start to get pretty entertaining.

TIM RONAN shooting some pool after getting barreled all day.

NICO and AUSTEN high 5 to a sick day. Austen was so stoked on all the snow and having a steady buzz that he started pile driving himself.

Nothing like giving yourself a whitewash and enjoying a big kid soda. AUSTEN seemed to be pretty stoked on shredding at the BIRD.

The sun actually started to come out after almost two weeks of stormy winter weather. It was pretty strange to see light for the first time.

The valley started to lighten up on Saturday evening and that meant BLUE BIRD for Sunday.

JDUBS slashing at the bottom of the AMPHITHEATER

JDUBS airing out of BLACK JACK gully

With new snow and BLUEBIRD skys that usually means tons of people and if it’s on a weekend it can get pretty crazy. We opted to head out into the backcountry from MINERAL BASIN. SNOWBIRD has access to some insane out of bounds touring terrain. TYLER ANDERSON was down to go for a walk and get a few more shots so we avoided the rat race and decided to put in a little extra work.

MITCH ALLEN can multi task like no other. Here is a little perk to being a photog….you get to shred the line first.

by mid day the snow started to heat up and we could tell our 12 day pow bender was coming to an end. Tyler found a a few shady zones that were still holding the snow long enough to stomp out a few more landings.

Working with TYLER ANDERSON is always a pleasure because he loves to POP harder than anyone and he really loves to land on his feet. This hip worked out well for all of us. After he moshed this method he started to send some lofty Front 5′s.

Then it was over. If you ever needed a reason to move out to UTAH and buy a BIRD pass we hope this helped you make up your mind. For more info about SNOWBIRD just CLICK HERE.

BODE MERRILL has been been spending some time in Japan and judging by the pics he just sent it looks like he and his crew are having a good time. 

“Its fucking sick out here  the snow is blower and it doesnt stop snowing… ever! The crew is me java grendys dirksen louif LNP and photog ashley barker and were having a good ol time.”