The author, Tom Cohen, is an Emmy Award-winning writer, producer and director. He is the owner of Wanderlust Entertainment, which develops creative video content.
As Caps fans revel in Stanley Cup Fever and we all collectively rock the red, it’s interesting to think about the critical role weather plays in the game of hockey. Well, at least I find it interesting as someone who loves the weather.
Hockey is a game of inches — sometimes less — and winning or losing can come down to a puck hitting or not hitting the post, sliding just under a goalie’s pad, or bouncing just ever-so-slightly the wrong way.
The outcome of the game can also be affected by the condition of the ice, and the ice is only as good as the indoor weather it relies on. One degree in either direction, a dew point that’s just a tad too high, relative humidity that’s not quite right and the ice can make it almost impossible to skate, shoot or pass the puck properly.
It’s not easy getting the ice to be just right at playoff time, particularly if the weather outside the arena is not optimal. It might be too humid (we’re looking at you, Tampa) or ridiculously hot (that’s right, Las Vegas). Fighting the elements to make a rink in an arena as smooth as possible takes a team of highly-trained “indoor weathermakers” with only the high stakes of the Stanley Cup Finals on their shoulders.
If someone asked you how to make the ice inside a hockey arena just right for a critical Stanley Cup Finals game and you said “it’s got to be really cold,” you’re part of the way there.
If you add, “well you’ve gotta use reverse osmosis to remove excess oxygen and certain undesirable minerals from the water,” that would be an even better answer. Turns out too much oxygen in the water makes the ice too soft, and so do too many minerals. But too few minerals will leave the ice way too hard, so there’s a fine balance that has to be met.
To keep the ice that cold, salty water runs through pipes under the rink. Of course, salty water freezes at a much lower temperature than regular water. The brine running under the rink keeps the ice at around 16 degrees, and the surface of the ice itself around 20 degrees or so.
But that’s just the ice itself. Before the players and fans even think about arriving, the “indoor weather makers” have been carefully monitoring the conditions inside the arena. They blow air in and out as needed to keep it just right. As Washingtonians are keenly aware, it’s the combination of temperature and humidity that really matters.
The night before a game, the weathermakers try to keep the arena around 60 degrees, and the humidity in the mid-to-upper 30s. Sounds like a nice November day around here. During the game itself, the humidity can creep up to 50 percent, and that’s okay. If it starts to creep up toward 60 percent, then there might be trouble. Soft ice means bouncing pucks, slow skating and messy passing.
While the aforementioned conditions are optimal, keeping the ice and arena itself in that state requires some cooperation from Mother Nature. And that’s not what Mother Nature does best. Ice conditions are always a concern when you’re playing so late in the season, especially in places like Vegas and D.C. Sometimes it’s just too hot or too humid for those rink geniuses to keep the ice exactly where they — and the players — want it.
So the next time you watch a hockey game and marvel at the speed of Evgeny Kuznetsov’s skating, or the velocity of an Alexander Ovechkin one-timer, take time to think about the intrepid “indoor weather-makers” that make it all possible.