Nuuk officials hope for more snow before 2016 Arctic Winter Games

City officials in Nuuksay plans are in place in case not enough snow falls before the Greenland capital hosts the 2016 Arctic Winter Gamesin March.

"Most things are under control,"said LarsDamkjaer,Nuuk'schief communications officer.

"We worked very hard to get the venues ready, to get a biathlon course, for instance. We never had that. But it all looks good now. The only thing that worries us is the lack of snow.

"We have snow machines and we've got plans for what we'll do. Perhaps we'll shorten the courses for the cross-country skiing," he said.

Damkjaerestimates there's about half a metre of snow inNuuk, far less than the three metres the city had this time last year.

"The events will be held but we'd much rather have more snow then we've got now," he said.

Snow issues aside, with a little more than a month before Nuuk hosts the games, Damkjaer says a buzz is growing in the city of 17,000.

Around 2,000 people including 800 athletes are expected to descend on Nuuk for the one-week biannual event that has drawn criticism for excluding six sports including curling and speed skating.

That decision was made by the Arctic Winter Games International Committee.

"Whatever Arctic Winter Games decides, that's under Arctic Winter Games organization," Damkjaer said.

Hockey events to be heldin Iqaluit

City ofNuukofficials were inIqaluitthis week meeting withofficialsand touring the arenawhere hockey events will be held.

Iqaluitwill play host to the games' hockey tournamentand is expecting around 180 athletes to fly to and from Nuuk for the opening and closing ceremonies, a cheaper option than building a hockey arena in Greenland.

Chartered flights from Nuuk to Iqaluit willland every 15 minutes at the Iqaluit International Airport, Damkjaer said.

Nuuk's deputy mayor Annie Iigin Mathewson said inKalaallisut, a Greenland dialect, thather city is looking forward to the games.

"I hope that the competitors and everyone coming here will have fun and participate fully and compete to their best," she told CBC Nunavut's morning radio show, Qulliq.

As for the snow, she said the day before leaving Nuuk for Iqaluitsome had fallen, though she is hoping for more.

"There's no such thing as typical Nuuk weather,"Damkjaersaid.

"There will be snow. But we'd much rather have more than we've got now."