With the sun slowly beginning to peak over East Wall, Arapahoe Basin Ski Area head snowmaker Bill LeClair stands on High Noon and watches as snow begins to blanket the intermediate ski run. 

For the last decade, LeClair has been spending many of his fall mornings under the shadows of East Wall, working tirelessly to safely open the mountain as soon as possible for the season. 

LeClair is one of the county’s most premier snowmakers. Prior to being A-Basin’s head snowmaker, LeClair cut his teeth at Mount Sunapee in New Hampshire.

“My folks told me that I had to get a job,” LeClair said. “I lived 20 minutes from the ski area and I was like, ‘I don’t want to be no stinking lift operator.'”

In 1984, LeClair became a snowmaker at Mount Sunapee, jumpstarting a career that would span multiple decades, states and ski areas. After serving as a snowmaker at nearby Keystone Resort, LeClair joined the team as A-Basin.

Being a snowmaker at any ski area is not an easy job. The occupation requires late nights, early mornings and meticulous work. On Thursday evening, Oct. 16, LeClair and his crew of other snowmakers were able to fire up the snowguns at around 7 p.m.

Snowmaking operations went off without a hitch for several hours until LeClair got a call at around 1 a.m. that there was a problem.

“I came in yesterday at like 6:30 till 7,” LeClair said. “I went home and then I got a call from the snowmakers that we had a problem. I couldn’t communicate with the pumps with my app on the phone. I live in the Cove, so I got up there pretty quick.”

LeClair arrived and discovered that the pumps were still running, but a lot of the guns had tripped. Despite LeClair’s snowmaking team only being made up of four other employees, the ski area was able to get everything back up and running rather quickly. 

“There are challenges,” LeClair said. “We are a small system and small crew. When I worked down the road, I had 28 snowmakers. Now I have four. But for how small our system is, it is like the little train that says, ‘I think I can, I think I can.’ When we get going, we crush it.”

Snowmaking operations then continued to take place throughout the morning and much of the day on Friday, Oct. 17. Like many other ski areas, A-Basin typically waits for a wet-bulb temperature of around 26 degrees Fahrenheit before beginning snowmaking operations.

The temperature is low enough for the water to freeze into snow, but is not so cold that it becomes difficult to produce large volumes of snow. While 26 degrees is a good starting point to make snow, LeClair’s ideal wet-bulb temperature is actually 10 degrees Fahrenheit. 

“The ideal temperature for me if all the stars lined up would be 10 degrees,” LeClair said. “Part of our job is keeping an eye on the temperatures and if it warms up, start turning the guns down. We do not want to create crappy snow.”

In the early morning hours on Friday, A-Basin had 18 different guns going at once along the ski area’s opening day terrain offering — High Noon.

“We are a little snowmaking system,” LeClair said. “We are maxed out on water right now which means we can’t pump any more water. When it gets colder you put more water through them, so right now we are about a thousand gallons a minute.”

Throughout his years as a snowmaker, LeClair has seen technology advance, making the task of making snow easier than it was when he first started in the 1980s. 

“I worked at Keystone for over 25 years, and I was involved with installing all the automation,” LeClair said. “So automation is a big thing now. You can capture the windows of temperature and you can capture water. Water is like gold now. It is serious. It is a big resource.”

The more advanced snowguns ultimately allow A-Basin and other ski areas to only run the snowguns when the temperatures allow. When ski areas blow snow when temperatures are too warm, it creates low quality snow that is not fun to ski on throughout the entirety of the season. 

“If you make terrible snow, it has a great memory, it sticks around all season,” LeClair said. “You want to give the guest the best snow quality possible. Automation and then a lot of low energy guns that use less electricity have been the biggest advancements.”

In order to make snow, a snow gun needs pressurized water and compressed air. Around the outside of the snow gun are nucleator nozzles that create a mist of tiny water droplets that mixes with compressed air, which then flash-freezes into microscopic ice crystals. 

The ice crystals then act as the “nuclei” for the rest of the water that is being sprayed from the gun to freeze onto as they fall, forming artificial snow. 

“I am not going to say snowmaking is dangerous, but you have to have it together,” LeClair said. “You always have to be focused on your partner. Safety is the number one priority. I tell the snowmakers that they are hourly and that they need to take their time.”

Although A-Basin has a small snowmaking team, it is routinely the first ski area in the state to open for the 2025-26 season. Over the years, many people have pinned A-Basin against its neighbor Keystone to be the first to open, but LeClair does not like to think of it as a race. 

“Deep down I take pride when we are first to open,” LeClair said. “But when people start talking about the race side, I don’t like hearing that.The goal is to get this done and everybody is safe at the end of the day and they are able to go home. If that happens and you don’t have any hiccups, that is a good day.”

After working at several different resorts throughout his career, LeClair is thankful for his intimate crew of snowmakers at A-Basin. 

“I am very fortunate here that I have got a strong crew,” LeClair said. “They love what they are doing. And they love working at Arapahoe Bain. I have been blessed with that. Coming in last night is just the name of the game. It is like I am a doctor on call.”

Arapahoe Basin will continue making snow whenever conditions allow in preparation for opening day. According to LeClair, temperatures over the next several days look cold enough to allow some round-the-clock snowmaking. Last season, A-Basin opened up on Nov. 2, alongside its neighbor Keystone.