Amador County – Forty-eight hours after a fire in Alpine County cut electrical power, Kirkwood Mountain Resort announced it has restored 100 percent of its operations and was open Monday to “full mountain skiing.” Kirkwood Senior Vice President Tim Cohee announced the reopening of all access in an e-mail Sunday, saying full operation was planned to be available Monday. A New Year’s Day fire at a local utility power plant left Kirkwood and the surrounding community in both Amador and Alpine counties without electricity, but power at the resort has restored to “100 percent of its operations” and was to be open with “full mountain skiing” on Monday. Cohee said: “It’s been a challenging 2 days, but thanks to a tremendous effort by both the Mountain Utilities (electric company) and resort staff, we were able to bring power back to the entire community, including the resort, commercial core and 600 residential units.” Kirkwood resort was able to provide skiing on Sunday and brought most of its lifts on-line by the early afternoon. Cohee said a “diesel engine exhaust system failure caused the Mountain Utilities plant to catch fire at about 2 p.m.” last Friday, “completely destroying the 6 engines, switch gear and other plant equipment over a 4-hour period.” The electricity provider was able to bring in 3 portable diesel generators by Friday night, with more than double the capacity necessary to run the entire community. Kirkwood is open 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and has 2,300 skiable acres, a base elevation of 7,800 feet and a top elevation of 9,800 feet. The resort has 14 lifts, including 2 high-speed quads, 6 triples and 4 surface lifts. The Resort reports an “uphill capacity” of 19,205 skiers per hour. Its longest run is 2-and-a-half miles, and it has 50 percent intermediate slopes, 15 percent beginner, 20 percent advanced and 15 percent expert slopes. Kirkwood had sunny, calm skies and 24 degree temperatures Tuesday, reporting 15 to 19 inches of snow in the last week, and between 125 and 174 inches for the season. For more information about Kirkwood, call (209) 258-6000. Story by Jim Reece This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.