By PAULA TRACY, InDepthNH.org
THOMPSON AND MESERVES PURCHASE – Gov. Kelly Ayotte, her husband and son visited a wintery scene at Mount Washington State Park on its 6,288-foot summit Friday and learned about all that is going on atop the rock pile when the wind is gusting close to 100 miles per hour.
They were rare visitors in winter when the park is closed but where weather observation goes on, in sometimes brutal conditions, by the staff of the Mount Washington Observatory.
As they were leaving, the temperature was 28F degrees at the base of the mountain it was 11F degrees at the summit with wind speeds gusting to 96 miles per hour and with the wind chill that made it minus 20 degrees at the outset https://mountwashington.org/weather/current-summit-conditions/. The visibility virtually whiteout, 1/16th of a mile and the webcams showed a few deck tiles and then fuzzy white.
Executive Councilor Joe Kenney, R-Wakefield, played host for the trip and climbed into the state park snow cat for the Mount Washington Auto Road, promising to be InDepthNH.org’s photographer.
Auto Road snow cat tours do not go to the summit. The park building is closed to the public in winter but it is occupied by the Mount Washington Observatory and others who are ferried back and forth in winter shifts which are usually days apart.
To get there, snow cat plows its way back and forth breaking through the snow drifts at times along the Auto Road, where they can encounter winds of more than 100 miles per hour.
In addition to the new governor, Kelly Ayotte, her husband Joseph N. Daley and son, Jacob Daley, Kenney provided a guest list that included Tobey Reichert, general manager of the Mt. Washington Auto Road and its consultant and former general manager Howie Wemyss; Ryan Presby, general manager of the Mount Washington Cog Railway Company and its general counsel Earl Duval; Patrick Hummel, supervisor of Mount Washington State Park and State Parks Director Brian Wilson; Jess Wilson, director of lodging and hospitality for the Appalachian Mountain Club; Drew Bush, executive director of the Mount Washington Observatory and its director of external affairs, Charlie Buterbaugh and Ayotte staff.
It began at 9:30 a.m. at the base of the Auto Road in Gorham.
They climbed in the tracked vehicle to the “winter cut off” and Cragway for a discussion with the Appalachian Mountain Club. The group was scheduled to arrive at the summit by 11 a.m. in the Mount Washington Observatory living quarters.
After a tour of the observatory and the state park facilities at the summit the group was to join in a roundtable lunch moderated by Councilor Kenney.
Much of Kenney’s district includes the state’s North Country.
After lunch there was a discussion planned with the Mount Washington Cog Railway Company and a visit to one of its trains at the summit.
There was to be a similar discussion with Mount Washington Auto Road at 2 p.m.
Both businesses rely on the state park at the summit for their business operations and lease space from the state.
The plan was for the entourage, with members of the governor’s staff, to depart the summit for base of Mount Washington after that and end with a dinner at The Glen House’s The Notch Grille.
Meeting with the press prior to the trip on Wednesday in her office, the governor said she was looking forward to the exciting visit and thrilled her teenage son and husband would be along for the trip to one of the state’s most iconic locations, the highest peak in the Northeast.
ASSESSMENT UNDERWAY
The visit comes at a time when environmental concerns for the wildly popular summit are being studied as part of recommendations from a 10-year master plan which was approved by the Mount Washington Commission in 2022.
The advisory commission to Sarah Stewart, commissioner of the state Department of Resources and Economic Development, is comprised of various partners that use the state-owned summit including the Mount Washington Auto Road, Appalachian Mountain Club, TownSquare Media, the Cog Railway, the observatory and the U.S. Forest Service.
At two public hearings on the proposed master plan in 2022, the commission heard concerns about business interests at the summit and the state’s overseeing of the 60-acre state park in the face of intense use, climate change and the vulnerable and rare alpine zone.
In the last state budget cycle and promoted by then-Senate President Jeb Bradley, R-Wolfeboro, who chaired the commission, the legislature agreed to fund an independent environmental and structural assessment related to the comfortable carrying capacity of the park.
That study is now underway with the firm Tighe & Bond chosen to handle the assessment, said Brian Wilson, director of the division of parks at the state DNCR.
Some members of the public said in 2022 that agreeing to the 10-year plan before the assessment was putting the cart before the horse.
Jamie Sayen of North Stratford said in 2022 at the meeting on finalizing the plan, “We have a problem. Human aspirations are in conflict with natural limits. We cannot change natural laws and limits…or the law of carrying capacity but we can modify human behavior.”
Others said that they would rather have it in place and hear what the environmental and structural report shows.
The assessment report from Tighe & Bond is due in January 2026, Wilson said.