Thursday, January 6, 2011

Snowmaker to the Rescue

Okemo Mountain Resort operates on a 24/7 schedule 365 days a year. Sure, during the winter months we open a ski area during the daylight hours, but there is so much more that happens throughout the night. In fact, most times our guests are not even aware - but there is always something going on.

On the day of the big snow storm last week (Dec 26-27th) a guest who was staying at Trailside had her two beagles escape from their unit. Of course the wind was howling and the snow blowing, making it nearly impossible to find them. She called Okemo and the word went out to the night staff to be on the look out for these two dogs. Unfortunately those little characters weren’t seen at all that night... they must have had their nose to the ground looking for rabbits!

Well on the evening of January 2nd Jason Burton (who was the snowmaker on the noon to midnight shift) spotted them on the Buckhorn trail. He immediately called Brian Boudrou, our Night Operations Manager and he came and picked the dogs up and took them down into his office for the night. He laid some jackets on the floor and turned the heat up. Except for a few porcupine quills from an encounter in the woods, they weren’t too worse for the wear - just two very tired pups.

Brian called the owner the next morning, who was ecstatic to learn they had been found. He then arranged them to be transported to the local animal clinic where they could be looked over while awaiting their "people".

Many thanks to Brian, Jason and the entire Night Operations crew - you went above and beyond in making this happy ending.

Bruce

6 comments:

Unknown said...

it shows they are hard working people making the okemo difference known around the mountain.

Unknown said...

What a touching story! Not a surprise to me though - in my many years of skiing at Okemo I have always been very impressed with the service.
Thank you, Okemo, for helping these pups in their time of need :-)

Unknown said...

What a touching story! Not a surprise to me though - in my many years of skiing at Okemo I have always been very impressed with the service.
Thank you, Okemo, for helping these pups in their time of need :-)

MarkRenkert said...

Great Rescue Story and epitomizes the kind of care and passion the Okemo Staff bring to the table.

And for Jason Burton and Brian Boudrou....... they certainly deserve special mention during the Jan 8th Employee Event at 5:30pm.

Well Done Okemo !


Mark E. Renkert, Mcsl
South Burlington, VT

Mark Larson said...

Hey, was that Molly and Moe (I think those were their names). I saw a flyer posted in Singleton's last week with pics of 2 lost beagles. I hope it was them!

Unknown said...

Many thanks to Jason Burton and Brian Boudrou who found our pups, Molly and Moe on top of Okemo Mountain Buckhorn trail! Thank you so much. What a miracle! You guys went above and beyond to rescue them. They ran out the door right before the blizzard came through, December 26. We searched for hours, called the Okemo Ski area lost and found ,posted pictures at ski area, called police and dog warden Steve, passed flyers to people and posted them in Shaws, Singleton's and the snowmobile rental place. The weather improved and they must have found their way back to Okemo somehow. They had porcupine needles in their snouts which had to be removed, but all in all they are in good shape. They lost ten pounds each. Good thing they were a little chubby. Everyone was so kind and helpful. Thank you so much. The Murphys