Safety Awareness

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

LAKE TAHOE RESORTS SHOWCASE CREATIVE SAFETY AWARENESS PROGRAMS

Sierra-at-Tahoe® and Northstar-at-Tahoe™ Resorts Encourage Guests and Employees to Practice Safe Skiing and Riding on the Slopes

TRUCKEE and SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. – Jan. 13, 2010 – As Northstar® and Sierra-at-Tahoe Resorts prepare to participate in the annual National Ski Areas Association (NSAA) Safety Awareness Week, January 16-22, 2010, resort employees have developed creative ideas designed to continue to help educate skiers, riders and employees about the importance of safety on the slopes. The free programs to be implemented at both resorts during Safety Week include:

Safety Information Stations
Both resorts will offer Safety Information Stations designed to communicate with guests about Safety Week and skier and rider responsibility and safety on the slopes. At Sierra-at-Tahoe Resort, the Safety Information Station will feature contests where guests can recite the Responsibility and Smart Style Codes for prizes and to be entered to win a helmet and goggles from Giro. Ski patrol dogs will make appearances, and the resort will host Avalanche Awareness and Smart Style clinics. At Northstar Resort, guests can enjoy hot chocolate, bananas, oranges and will be presented with safety-related literature.

Captain Safety
Captain Safety will be present on the mountain at Northstar Resort each day of Safety Week to help communicate skier and rider safety and responsibility to resort guests. And, the resort’s Kid’s Ski & Board School mascot, Marty the Martian will visit the Safety Information Station in the Village at Northstar to greet the resort’s young guests between 8am and 12pm. At Sierra™ Resort, Captain Safety will visit the Safety Information Station outside Teepee Town the first two and last two days of Safety Week from 10am to 1pm.

Kids Poster Contests
Throughout Safety Awareness Week, kids visiting the resorts will be invited to create a poster based on one or more of the elements of the responsibility or smart style codes. At the end of the week, both Northstar and Sierra-at-Tahoe Resorts will select winners which will then be submitted to NSAA’s national contest where they will compete against posters made by kids at ski areas across the country.

Terrain Park Contests
The Northstar Resort Terrain Park team will host contests throughout Safety Week at the base of the Superpipe. The first place finisher of each contest will win a safety-related prize. Contestants will only be entered into the competition when they’ve successfully recited the Smart Style Code to attendants at the safety information station in the Village at Northstar.

Street Theatre
One of the more popular Safety Week performances last year, “Mellow Yellow,” i.e. Northstar Resort’s lift maintenance department, is back by popular demand and will perform “street theater” in the lift lines around the mountain during the course of the week. Their creative performances will again focus on on-mountain safety-related topics.
 
Safety Awareness for Local School Kids
In an effort to help educate the local community, members of Sierra-at-Tahoe Resort’s Ski Patrol, including patrol dogs, will host assemblies at local elementary schools to talk about search procedures, dog rescue, transceiver training, safety codes and smart style.

Other resort activities include a National Ski Patrol Safety Awareness Booth at Northstar Resort where National Ski Patrollers will help to educate guests and recruit for the Patrol. They will host a daily contest and give away a helmet each day. Sierra-at-Tahoe Resort will include employees in the activities by entering them into a drawing to win a helmet if they can recite the Responsibility or Smart Style Code from memory. Smart Style videos will also loop through the resort’s closed circuit TV stations throughout the week.

For more information about Northstar and Sierra-at-Tahoe Resorts’ planned Safety Week events and activities, please visit www.NorthstarAtTahoe.com or www.SierraAtTahoe.com.

About Northstar-at-Tahoe Resort
One of the finest year-round mountain resorts in North America, Northstar Resort is host to a new base area village featuring 35 unique shops and restaurants, a conference center, 9,000 square foot skating rink, on-site lodging, special events and more. A winter sport enthusiast’s paradise, Northstar Resort offers 92 ski trails spread across 3,000 acres, award-winning terrain parks and snow sports including alpine and Telemark skiing, snowboarding, cross-country skiing, snowshoeing and tubing. Summer activities include mountain biking, golfing, scenic lift rides for sightseeing and hiking, horseback riding, fly-fishing and more.
 
Northstar-at-Tahoe Resort is located on Highway 267, just six miles north of Lake Tahoe and six miles south of downtown Truckee. For more information, call 1.800.GO.NORTH (1.800.466.6784) or visit www.NorthstarAtTahoe.com.

Sierra-at-Tahoe Resort: Keepin It Real
Recognized in the 2010 TransWorld SNOWboarding Resort Guide as a Top 10 Overall Resort as well as among the Top 10 Best Parks and Top 10 Best Pipes in the nation and known for its wind-protected slopes, incredible tree skiing and family programs, Sierra Resort is a bastion of the authentic California ski experience. Easy to get to and always laid-back, Sierra-at-Tahoe Resort welcomes skiers and snowboarders to escape from everyday life and enjoy the simple pleasure of winter in the mountains. Sierra Resort and the Eldorado National Forest are partners in recreation.

The closest major resort to Sacramento, Sierra-at-Tahoe Resort is located just 12 miles west of Lake Tahoe and receives an annual average of 480 inches of snowfall. For more information, visit www.SierraAtTahoe.com or call 530.659.7453.

Press Contacts:
Jessica VanPernis, 530.562.3866, jvanpernis@boothcreek.com
Kirstin Cattell, 530.543.3132, kcattell.st@boothcreek.com
Kristin Yantis, 775.351.7904, kyantis@myprco.com

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