Glenfiddich Snow Phoenix commemorates a moment of drama in the long history of The Glenfiddich Distillery. snow phoenix It all began in December 2009 when it started to snow - it kept snowing for several months. After weeks of record low temperatures and alternate freezing and thawing there were four feet of densely compacted snow on the distillery roofs.

On the evening of Thursday 7th January, in the most remote part of the snow covered distillery, some of our warehouse roofs collapsed, ripped open by the sheer weight of snow, leaving maturing oak casks of Glenfiddich exposed to the winter sky. It was as if some of the distillery angels had finished their 'share' and had come back looking for more.

In all 4 roofs collapsed and several more were badly damaged. The distillery engineers calculated that there were 400 kilograms of snow on every square metre of warehouse roof - the equivalent of a herd of elephants standing on top of each warehouse. The Glenfiddich Distillery team immediately swung into action - working around the clock to clear snow from the distillery and neighbouring warehouses to make everything safe. Enduring temperatures as low as -19°C (-2°F) they could only work for a few hours in the bitter cold before having to go indoors to thaw out.

Before the rebuilding of the warehouses could start, all the casks of maturing Glenfiddich had to be moved to other secure places where they could continue their maturation undisturbed.

I came to see the warehouses for myself and standing amongst the wreckage decided to create a special Glenfiddich whisky to mark this moment in the distillery's history and recognise the fantastic and difficult work carried out by the distillery team.

To create this whisky I selected the finest casks from the snow damaged warehouses – marrying together different ages of mature Glenfiddich – some very old. Some of these casks had previously held Oloroso sherry and others were traditional whisky casks made of American oak. Each one was specially chosen to make a unique contribution to the taste and aroma of the final whisky.

We have called it Snow Phoenix - a great Glenfiddich Single Malt born of chance and adversity. It is a limited edition, one of a kind and will only be bottled in 2010.

- Brian Kinsman, Glenfiddich Malt Master