The Hopi tribe is taking on an Arizona ski resort over its use of artificial snow: ‘People compare it to baptizing a baby with reclaimed water’

To the Hopi tribe, the San Francisco Peaks are sacred. The cluster of mountains rise dramatically from grasslands and ponderosa forests in northern Arizona, and the Hopi say they are home to spiritual beings called kachinas, believed to bring the rain and snow to their reservation.

But the tribe has been allowed to move forward with a lawsuit against a local ski resort over what the tribe deems to be a desecration of the holy mountains: spraying artificial snow made from treated sewage.

“People compare it to baptizing a baby with reclaimed water,” said Ed Kabotie, a Hopi tribal member and artist. “Nobody would think about something like that.”

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Signs around the Arizona Snowbowl resort, about 15 miles from Flagstaff, warn skiers not to drink the water used in making snow, but state regulations allow for its use in irrigating crops and watering parks. It has been found to contain trace amounts of substances such as Prozac, deet and ibuprofen. They occur on the order of a few dozen to a few hundred parts per trillion, which, for comparison, is far less than a grain of salt in an Olympic-sized swimming pool.

In its complaint, the tribe contends that the purity of sacred sites and natural resources will be compromised by artificial snow that gets blown outside the ski resort boundaries or seeps into the surrounding forest as it melts.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Ed Kabotie, a member of the Hopi tribe. Photograph: Caitlin O'Hara/for Getty/The Guardian

Even the act of making snow – of turning to manmade technology to replace the natural water cycle – goes against Hopi beliefs, said Leigh Kuwanwisiwma, the recently retired Hopi Cultural Preservation Office director. It is the duty of the spiritual people, the kachina people, to bring that snow, Kuwanwisiwma said.

Kabotie said that for a people who have learned to live with the cycles of the sun, the moon, seasons and moisture, “making snow is kind of like shaking your fist at God”.

The Hopi’s opposition to snowmaking echoes other recent efforts by Native American tribes to stand up to oil pipelines and mining on historic and sacred lands. In many cases, as at Snowbowl, these areas are now designated as public lands and are under the control of the federal government.

As climate change brings warmer and drier conditions to the US south-west, snowmaking is a hedge against shorter snow seasons and precipitation falling as rain instead of powder. There have been just 34in of natural snowfall at the resort this winter, too little to keep it open for business, but thanks to the snow guns the resort has made about three-quarters of its runs skiable with a thick layer of manmade powder..

“I don’t ever question tribal beliefs or culture. I don’t question that when they say it’s sacred. But it’s public land with a land use designation for a ski area and it has been designated that way since 1938,” said JR Murray, Snowbowl’s general manager. “There are hundreds of thousands of people per year that enjoy the recreation we provide and the snowmaking sustains that.”

Arizona Snowbowl opened 80 years ago and is one of just four ski resorts in this desert-dominated state. In legal battles that have continued for more than a decade, the Hopi and other tribes, sometimes joined by environmental groups, have sued the federal government and the city of Flagstaff to halt snowmaking at Snowbowl. So far, both county and federal judges have decided against the Hopi and other tribes, and Snowbowl has fired up its snow guns every winter since 2012.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest A sign warning visitors not to ingest the snow generated from wastewater at Arizona Snowbowl. Photograph: Caitlin O'Hara/for Getty/The Guardian

In 2016, the city and the tribe seemed close to reaching a settlement under which the city would construct a filtration system to further treat water before it is pumped up to the mountain. As part of the system’s design, water would percolate through earthen materials, emulating the spring water that emerges from desert mesas on the Hopi reservation. The tribe unanimously approved the agreement, but the Flagstaff city council chose to set the measure aside.

One lawsuit by the Hopi now remains in play and tribal members claimed a rare victory when, last week, the state appeals court ruled that their deep connection to the peaks gives the tribe standing to move forward with its claim that snowmaking causes a public nuisance.

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In the tourism-focused economy of Flagstaff, hotels, stores and restaurants depend on snow. “There is a direct correlation between what I’m doing in the shop and what Snowbowl has to offer,” said one local ski shop owner, Josh Bangle, who added that without artificial snowmaking, he probably would not be able to keep his doors open.

“It’s a frustrating thing for me because I live to ski and this is the closest and best option,” a Flagstaff resident, Caitlin Winterbottom, said. “But I also don’t necessarily love the idea of supporting an organization that is not respectful of the native tribes.”