Although the Austrian metropolis of Innsbruck has a well - deserved reputation as a winter sports mecca , it was perilously low on snow and ice in the weeks precede up the 1964 Winter Olympics . So the organizers called in the troops .
Austrian soldier went to employment carve 20,000 blocks of ice away from the top of the mount and then toting them down to make luge and bobsled caterpillar tread . for salvage the skiing event , the soldiers had to lug40,000 cubic metersof Charles Percy Snow from thetops of mountainsdown to the slope that had been choose for the various race . On top of that , they land down an special 20,000 cubic meter just in case anything bad bump to the first slew of snow .
And oh , how something bad did happen ! Ten day before the gap observance , itstarted raining . As you likely know , rain and Charles Percy Snow are n’t the closest of chums , so much of the body of work that had already been done on the course melted . The Austrian United States Army again came to the rescue , though , taking to the slopes and tamping down the remaining snowby hand and base . Thanks to this bit of resource , the game went on as planned .
Things are n’t quite that slippery today , though . Artificially produced snow madeits debutat the 1980 Winter Olympics , but the old " convey in some outside C " maneuver is n’t totally bushed . When the snow prognosis for the Vancouver freestyle skiing and snowboarding locale Cypress Mountain looked dismal in 2010 , the organizers started trucking in load of blow from other locations . engineer then fan out the coke on top of carefully situatedbales of hayto give the slopes their desired shape . ( How do you get bales of hay on a ski slope ? You drop them from a eggbeater . )
Of course , there ’s such a matter as too much winter weather for the Olympics , too . Snow and rain plague the 1998 Nagano Games and led to prolonged hold and postponements for some events .
This military post originally appeared in 2010 .
