Paradise Extreme Snow Exhibit Panel

The Paradise Inn can be almost completely covered in snow during the winter.

NPS Photo

Quick Facts

Location:

Paradise

Amenities

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Historical/Interpretive Information/Exhibits

Title: Extreme Snowfall

Main Text
In midsummer it may be difficult to imagine the quantity of snow that accumulates here. The Inn's architecture provides a clue - the steep roof is designed to shed heavy snow. On a larger scale, extreme annual snowfalls have created enormous glaciers that radiate from the summit of Mount Rainier. 

"Living under a mountainous snowdrift we could not hear the wind. The huge wooden building would creak and groan every night as the snow settled and bore down upon it... It often happened that our first evidence of a storm outside was to wake up at eight o'clock in the morning in midnight darkness. The tunnels had all been snowed over or drifted full in the night." - Floyd Schmoe, early Park Naturalist, who wintered at Paradise Inn, 1920.

Secondary Text
Annual snowfall is recorded at the Paradise Weather Station in the Paradise meadows, July 1 - June 30. 

During a year of extreme snowfall, Paradise Inn gets almost completely buried. 

This close to the coast, Mount Rainier is a magnet for storms. At moisture-laden Pacific air is forced to rise steeply, it cools and percipitates heavily on these slopes.  

Exhibit Panel Description
A single photo of the Paradise Inn in winter fills the exhibit panel. Of the building, only the outline of the angled roof, fireplaces, and a row of window gabled dormers along the roof are visible under a deep layer of snow. Behind the building, a hillside is covered in patchy forest beneath a ridge of snow-covered peaks. The main text stretches across the top third of the photo, with the secondary text is along the bottom of the photo. In the upper right corner of the panel is a simplified bar graph with three columns. The tallest column is labeled "1,122 inches, Record high (1971-72)". The middle column to the right is about half as tall as the first column and is labeled "640 inches, Average". The third column on the far right is again as half as tall as the middle column, and labeled "313 inches, Record low, 1939-40". A small box in the lower left corner of the panel reads "User Fee Project. Your Fee Dollars at Work. Entrance fees were used to produce this exhibit".

Visit This Exhibit Panel
The Paradise Extreme Snow Exhibit Panel is located on a low rock wall overlooking the Paradise Inn along the path to the Paradise Wilderness (Climbing) Information Center. The Paradise Road is open year-round, but closes nightly during the winter.