A Landslide Just Redrew The Map At Bridger Bowl

Snow? Bridger Bowl eats it for breakfast. But last week, it wasn’t flakes falling, it was rocks, dirt, and a whole lot of “uh oh.” A massive landslide ripped through the beloved ski area, turning steep chutes into something that looked more like a geology class gone rogue.

The slide stretched from Bridger Gully all the way to Slushman’s, taking out terrain like North Bowl, South Bowl, and the infamous “Zits.”  Some spots were stripped so deep, Bridger’s GM, Hiram Towle, said, “If I went and stood in it, it would be up to my chest—or deeper.”

Hiram knows a thing or two about wild weather; this will be his fourth season running the show. Usually, it’s Bridger’s “magic cloud” delivering that dreamy powder. But this time, it dumped a bit too much rain, too fast. Add in unstable ground and voilà, instant terrain makeover, courtesy of Mother Nature’s mood swing.

Thankfully, no lifts or buildings were damaged, though part of the slide did flirt dangerously close to Pierre’s Knob. Crews are already hard at work clearing debris, but some of the more rugged areas? It is what it is.

Hiram mentioned to a local news outlet that these new, deeper chutes may require several inches or even a foot of snow to become skiable.

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Still, Bridger isn’t backing down. As Hiram put it, “There’s a saying in the ski business: ‘Never enough to do it right, but always enough to do it twice.’"