Monday, January 23, 2012

Dubai facility gets ready to host snow penguins

Artificial 25-storey freezing ski hills will have a colony of Antarctic birds year-round in a specially-created area

  • By Derek Baldwin, Chief Reporter
  • January 24, 2012
  • Gulf News
A colony of snow penguins get acquainted with the environment at Ski Dubai
  • Image Credit: Photo courtesy: Ski Dubai
  • A colony of snow penguins get acquainted with the environment at Ski Dubai. The seafaring birds are part of what Ski Dubai said is a “multi-generation breeding programme at Sea World” and were born and bred in captivity.
Dubai: Snow penguins now living permanently at Ski Dubai's 25-storey snow-covered wonderland don't usually give interviews to the media.

But at month's end, Dubai's newest stars will meet the press in a media briefing before the mountain-themed ski hill opens its newest attraction, Snow Penguins at Ski Dubai, to the world sometime in February.

To be housed year-round in the 22,500 square-metre facility chilled to a constant -1 degree C to -2C and covered with snow, the colony of penguins "will live in a specially created environment which mirrors the Antarctica", Ski Dubai said in a statement.

Exciting attraction
 
The seafaring birds are part of what Ski Dubai said is a "multi-generation breeding programme at Sea World" and were born and bred in captivity.

Organisers billed the environmental awareness project as "the world's first exciting attraction of its kind" and pledged that patrons young and old will be offered a rare chance to see penguins in their new environment. "Visitors will soon have a rare opportunity to interact with these remarkable birds in a one-of-a-kind intimate encounter and learn about their unique traits and habits. Mall of the Emirates visitors will also be able to enjoy viewing the snow penguin's natural antics during the grand presentation of the ‘March of the Penguins', starting in February 2012," the ski resort said.

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