Muddy good recovery for resort
Fairmont recovers from disaster
It is the first Saturday in August and the Fairmont Hot Springs swimming pools are packed with guests and the Resort Lodge and RV Park are fully booked. On any other year this wouldn’t be unusual for the popular B.C. resort town, but this year it’s a good news story of mammoth proportions. On the afternoon of July 15, a massive mudslide swept down a creek bed completely burying the source of Fairmont’s famous odourless hot springs, damaging the water source for the lodge, wiping out a road and a footbridge leading to the RV Park, and damaging the Mountainside Golf Course.
For almost three weeks the 137-room Lodge, RV Park, and hot springs pools were closed while crews cleared debris, rebuilt a road and repaired the damage to the water supplies. Since most residents in the town work in the tourism industry and rely on rev- enues generated during the busy summer tourist season to make their livings, clearing the debris that buried the source of the hot springs and re-establishing a fresh water supply for the lodge was a top priority.
“The experience has really helped the community grow and pull together and has actually been an incredible morale builder for our staff,” said Marke Dickson, director of Sales and Marketing for Fairmont Hot Springs Resort. “We’ve been overwhelmed with help during this ordeal. With the Lodge completely closed, many of our employees took on tasks they were never hired to do. Guests, employees, contractors and the community all pulled together to get through this disaster.”
One of the other positives to come from the disaster was the opportunity to make improvements during the reconstruction process. The new intake system for the hot springs is an im- provement from the original established in the 1960s and the lodge is now connected to the municipality’s water supply ensuring a consistent and safe water supply for years to come.
Even the Mountainside Golf Course which was heavily damaged by the mudslide may become more interesting once it is repaired.
“It was heartbreaking to see the damage caused by the slide, but we’re using the rebuilding opportunity to make improvements,” said Peter Smith, executive vice-president of Fairmont Hot Springs Resort and director of golf.
“We’ve been working with renowned Canadian golf course architect Doug Carrick to figure out how to incorporate some of the debris into the course design and improve the impacted holes.”
Locals had been concerned that it might be diffi- cult to re-establish business after the disaster, but if the opening weekend is any indication, Fairmont Hot Springs is in good shape. All things considered, most guests didn’t even mind waiting in line to enjoy the hot springs pools.