A nonstop flight from Tokyo landed in Salt Lake City at about 11:30 a.m. Wednesday. The 12-hour flight is the first in a new service from Delta Air Lines. It is the first time Salt Lake City has seen an Airbus 330 jet on a regular basis and the first trans-Pacific service in the Intermountain region. The flight will run five times a week.

Utah ski resorts including Brighton line up for early openings

All that snow the past few days is paying off — Brighton Resort has pushed its opening day up a day to Thursday. Snowbird is also moving its first day up to Saturday, a week earlier than previously scheduled. And with Solitude opening Friday, Utah’s resorts are off to one of their earlier starts in the past decade.

Olympic snowboarding medal hope Kevin Pearce remains in a critical condition after suffering a head injury during a training ground accident in Utah. The 22-year-old American suffered a ”severe, traumatic brain injury” after landing on his head during a double back-flip, said doctor Holly Ledyard. Pearce — one of the United States’ best snowboarders — was preparing for qualifiers for the Vancouver Games.

A 4-year-old girl was flown to the hospital in serious condition after falling from a ski chairlift Saturday at Alta Ski Area. The girl was riding the Sunnyside chairlift about 4:30 p.m. when she apparently fell 30 to 40 feet, said Unified Fire Authority Capt. Clint Smith.

Deer Valley Resort has been named the #1 ski resort in North America by the readers of SKI Magazine for an incredible third year in a row. Remarkably, in the past nine years, Deer Valley’s rating hasn’t dipped lower than third, with a #2 ranking in 2002; a #1 ranking in 2003; a #3 rating in 2004; a #2 ranking in 2005; another #1 ranking in 2006, a #2 ranking in 2007, a #1 ranking in 2008, 2009 and now for the upcoming 2010 season.

A bankruptcy battle has broken out at the idled Elk Meadows ski area, where developers couldn’t raise enough money to build an exclusive gated community in the mountains above Beaver.

The Winter Dew Tour, the world’s premiere season-long winter action sports tour, announced that Mount Snow Resort will host the third and final stop Feb. 5–7, 2010 of the Tour’s second season. The Winter Dew Tour showcases top winter athletes from around the world competing in freeskiing (slopestyle and superpipe) and snowboarding (slopestyle and superpipe) for both men and women.