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SEATTLE — Weird sports history was made yet again when nearly 6,000 yahoos descended on Seattle Snow Day, the world's largest snowball fight.
But first there was the matter of the snow.
Organizers of Saturday’s madness did something Mother Nature could not: drop 162,000 pounds of snow on Emerald City. Thirty-four dump trucks of the stuff, scooped from the mountains and dumped outside the Seattle Center, right next to the Space Needle and Paul Allen's Experience Music Project Museum.
"I grew up in Colorado," said Mara "Attila The" Hahn, a nanny and performer in a Seattle Afro pop band, "so I think it's hysterical they're having to import snow here. The 'snow' we have here is so adorable."
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Epic Cardboard Tube Battles Delight Worldwide Of course she threw some air quotes while saying "snow," because Seattle sees way more rain than snow. But that doesn’t mean Seattlites don’t know what to do when the powder starts flying. Before the fight started in earnest, several groups arrived early to form snow forts. Some of the castles were simply medieval. Others, not so much.
"Needs to be a little higher for us to survive," Royce Moriarty, a sophomore at the University of Washington, noted while inspecting his team's defense and eying everyone else’s offense. He was there with about 30 Alpha Sigma Phi brethren building a frozen frat fort. "It's going to be interesting."
A few local corporate types showed up to play. REI seemed like a logical fit, given the region’s penchant for the outdoors. Emerald City Comicon was appropriately quirky. Walmart, though, caught me by surprise. Tom McReynolds, a regional marketing manager for the retailer Goliath, said his company sponsors several charities, including the Boys & Girls Clubs of King County, the beneficiary of the day’s festivities. Organizers raised about $50,000.
Fort Wal-Mart was looking pretty scrappy, with large patches of dirty snow being sprayed over with blue food coloring. "It may be ugly, but it serves a purpose,” McReynolds said. It did not have a greeter. Odd.
I asked him if his team was going to kick ass. "Absolutely," he said. "We have a minor league pitcher. He's our ace in the hole."
In addition to ringers, some peeps showed up with snowball makers and had amassed serious arsenals hours before the first toss. Rapidly dropping temperatures left people with a lot of, um, icy balls. Eye protection was required, but not enforced. The next time I attend the World Record Snowball Fight, I'm bringing a bike helmet. And a flak jacket.
The main event, scheduled to begin at 5 p.m., started more than a half hour late because of a bottleneck getting into the venue. Sure, you're supposed to have fun and all, but this is a supposed to be a record-setting fight. Quantity over punctuality.
Not that the delay stopped people from prematurely tossing snowballs. How else are you supposed to pass time while waiting for a snowball fight? It got a bit out of hand. "Do you like the music?” someone asked over the PA. “Then please don't aim snowballs at the DJ." Of course, it didn’t help that the guy kept playing, "Ice, Ice Baby.”
The battlefield was split more or less into two halves, with one having a large and wide sniper's alley. People (and photographers) crossed at their own peril. While stupidly passing through that dangerous stretch, I ran right toward a cat with a huge smile and a huge snowball in each hand.
"Your camera saves you," he told me. It’s one of the rare times in my career I’d heard that.
If you watch video of the record-setting snowball fight in South Korea two years ago, it looks playful and fun, with 5,387 people playfully tossing powdered snow in the air for a minute. Pfft. This is Seattle, baby. These kids were a little more on task.
The entire night took a life of its own, as some played a form of storm the castle. Many threw snowballs wildly and blindly. Smart ones ducked. Dumb ones didn’t. Many earned welts for their bravado/stupidity.
The official fight lasted a minute or so, though the armistice wasn't strictly enforced after the timed round.
The official announcement that we (yes, I hurled my share of snowballs, too) set a world record, was interrupted by repeated PA announcements along the lines of, "Can we get an EMT to the front stage?" I went to investigate. Sure enough, there were a few banged-up revelers. One woman near the stage was getting warm hugs from friends while nursing a bloody nose with, naturally, a large snowball. She also was laughing and smiling through her pain.
What I didn't realize was that were 130 judges watching for pacifists. Those not playfully playing were deducted from the total inside the field of play. The "official" count by Guinness was 5,834, though I saw a couple of good friends sneak in over the fence.
As folks wandered off for the post-game pub crawl, some posed for photographs like tourists in front of Roman ruins, a visual souvenir to accompany their war stories.
"I feel like I'm a kid. That's why I'm here," said Hahn. "And I don't have to be home by dark."
All photos: Sol Neelman
