Alpine Snow And Skiing Thread

[john w]

Always the Way Fozzi,

I guess my first reasonable attempt here, biased of course to where im going, but ill try not to be IMBY and equally wouldnt dare dream of being as detailed and succinct as JACKONE.

With the jet so far south the low pressures that would usually traverse England and the low copuntries are tracing towards spail favouring some slightly cooler winds...particularly from the NE. This goes for France, Andorra and Italy. Italy has to be careful not to get milder SW'erlys but in any case, cooler air coming off the continent may produce a snow fest on many Southern mountains for Italy.

Very interestingly as these lows spin off shortwaves and fronts inthe direction of the North and the cold air from the continent moves South there is the potential for some good accumumlations. Also Southern facing slopes may well just do better than the Northern facing ones in the very unusual setups we have at the moment.

Austria, I am afraid, is too climatologically different for my expertise to comment but I at least from my crude knowledge of Mountain and continental climatology can say austria looks to be the coldest place to ski in terms of temperatures next week.

Going on precipitation, the setups eluded to above seem to come to fruition on the preceip charts for the GFS and Meto and JMA. Out past 72 ECMWF also hints at a very Wet North East Italy and French southern alps, Switzerland also seeing some precipitation, but for swiss snow I always see a direct westerly with an approach at appz 080 degrees will always produce better results for frontal rain. From the South south west, there are a lot more mountains to get over before it reaches the swiss alps but as always, some will remain.

The season has had a lot of fluctuations between warm and cold. With a N-easterly continental flow developing this week, there is the potential for very cold conditions and snow to low levels. I would suggest the only dange of rain is:

1) If the low pressures track a little too far north and prolonged warming from warm sectors occurs.

2) The very low resorts at southern extremities of the ski area...i.e Spanish and Pyrenee resorts.

3) If an inversion occurs due to exceptionally cold uppers and warm sector gets trapped...though under other conditions this can lead to significant snow.

4) If a lee side low develops in NW italy creating a SW/S draw, this does not seem likely considering the potential for the jet, but always something to watch.

Not got in to the art of cut and paste charts but Mon and Thur next week look snowy for most.

John

[J10]

http://forum.netweather.tv/topic/59492-alps-forecast-9/

The latest Ski Blog is now out, very much staying on the cold side, with a chance of some snow at items, more especailly to SE parts of the Alps.

Always the Way Fozzi,

I guess my first reasonable attempt here, biased of course to where im going, but ill try not to be IMBY and equally wouldnt dare dream of being as detailed and succinct as JACKONE.

With the jet so far south the low pressures that would usually traverse England and the low copuntries are tracing towards spail favouring some slightly cooler winds...particularly from the NE. This goes for France, Andorra and Italy. Italy has to be careful not to get milder SW'erlys but in any case, cooler air coming off the continent may produce a snow fest on many Southern mountains for Italy.

Very interestingly as these lows spin off shortwaves and fronts inthe direction of the North and the cold air from the continent moves South there is the potential for some good accumumlations. Also Southern facing slopes may well just do better than the Northern facing ones in the very unusual setups we have at the moment.

Austria, I am afraid, is too climatologically different for my expertise to comment but I at least from my crude knowledge of Mountain and continental climatology can say austria looks to be the coldest place to ski in terms of temperatures next week.

Going on precipitation, the setups eluded to above seem to come to fruition on the preceip charts for the GFS and Meto and JMA. Out past 72 ECMWF also hints at a very Wet North East Italy and French southern alps, Switzerland also seeing some precipitation, but for swiss snow I always see a direct westerly with an approach at appz 080 degrees will always produce better results for frontal rain. From the South south west, there are a lot more mountains to get over before it reaches the swiss alps but as always, some will remain.

The season has had a lot of fluctuations between warm and cold. With a N-easterly continental flow developing this week, there is the potential for very cold conditions and snow to low levels. I would suggest the only dange of rain is:

1) If the low pressures track a little too far north and prolonged warming from warm sectors occurs.

2) The very low resorts at southern extremities of the ski area...i.e Spanish and Pyrenee resorts.

3) If an inversion occurs due to exceptionally cold uppers and warm sector gets trapped...though under other conditions this can lead to significant snow.

4) If a lee side low develops in NW italy creating a SW/S draw, this does not seem likely considering the potential for the jet, but always something to watch.

Not got in to the art of cut and paste charts but Mon and Thur next week look snowy for most.

John

A very good summary there, on the whole it looks very cold across the Alps, but at times with much milder weather across the Pyrenees. As for your call about Italy, again I think you are spot on, there does seem to be what we would call "channel lows" moving eastwards across Central Italy over the next few days, giving the chance of some heavy snowfalls over parts of Italy and SE austria on its northern edge.

Into next weekend, and it looks really bitter, not only is this cold going to take some shifting, resorts with snow cannons should be really building up snow levels, and that is without the snowfalls which can be expected over the next week or so.

[john w]

http://forum.netweather.tv/topic/59492-alps-forecast-9/

The latest Ski Blog is now out, very much staying on the cold side, with a chance of some snow at items, more especailly to SE parts of the Alps.

A very good summary there, on the whole it looks very cold across the Alps, but at times with much milder weather across the Pyrenees. As for your call about Italy, again I think you are spot on, there does seem to be what we would call "channel lows" moving eastwards across Central Italy over the next few days, giving the chance of some heavy snowfalls over parts of Italy and SE austria on its northern edge.

Into next weekend, and it looks really bitter, not only is this cold going to take some shifting, resorts with snow cannons should be really building up snow levels, and that is without the snowfalls which can be expected over the next week or so.

Cheers J1.

Im a heathen for forgetting snow cannons and completely agree with that. All resorts that have them should be utilising them. In fact, as it has been so cold id be surprised if some have not run out of water storage ...only joking.

Entrenched entrenched cold is going to become established over europe. Very hard to see when this will shift. I fly for trip one on the 16th and it is still looking locked in a cold pattern even then.

Should set up a NW ski trip in yrs to come!

[mcboz]

Hi All,

Just back from Val d'Isere. Conditions were excellent and it snowed every day, sometimes with complete a complete white out. When the sun did poke though it was amazing, some runs had over a foot of un-pisted snow. Wasn't massively cold, and did rain a tiny amount on the Wednesday, but was soon replaced with even more snow! Anyone going to Val d’Isere or Tignes in the near future is going to have amazing skiing conditions.

Interestingly, the snow rain limit was miss-forecast by the french met office and any GFS based forecasts, for example on the Wednesday it was due to rain all day (and night) with a rain snow limit of 2300 metres + (Val D is at 1850), but eneded up dumping snow after a little rain early in the morning. I've never been away and seen snow falling every single day.

Some pictures attached....

[J10]

Current snow depths at our featured resorts, In Brackets on 24th December

France

Val d'Isere 90cm/150cm (68cm/110cm), Last Snow 15cm 4 Jan

Meribel 60cm/115cm (29cm/107cm), Last Snow 15cm 3 Jan

Switzerland

Wengen 23cm/80cm (20cm/60cm), Last Snow 5cm 4 Jan

Austria

Niederau 35cm/70cm (10cm/60cm), Last Snow 5cm 2 Jan

Italy

Sestriere / Sauze d'Oulx 80c,/120cm (60cm/80cm), Last Snow 60cm 24 Dec

Lovely photos there of Val D'Isere

[J10]

http://forum.netweather.tv/topic/60127-alps-forecast-10/

Latest Ski Blog now out, snow over weekend drier next week.

[stuboy]

Well I'm off to Sauze d'Oulx Sunday morning, flight is at 06:40. However it is from Gatwick so I'm not holding out much hope on being on time, and dare I say it with the weather heading there it could be cancelled?! I also note that our destination airport in Turin is experiencing snow as well. I really hope we get out there though, snow at the weekend then a dry week would lead to perfect conditions. I must also say I'm a tad gutted to be leaving the UK during this awesome spell of cold weather!

[scott_anthony_glasgow]

Everybody whos spending money on a trip to the european alps get yourself upto Scotland some seriously good conditions to be had with cairngorms apparantly having a depth of 150cm+ excellent

Scott

[J10]

http://forum.netweather.tv/topic/60447-alps-forecast-11/

Latest Ski conditions forecast now out.

[johnholmes]

Everybody whos spending money on a trip to the european alps get yourself upto Scotland some seriously good conditions to be had with cairngorms apparantly having a depth of 150cm+ excellent

Scott

except they are still trying to dig the road to the car park out and then they have to dig out the funicular and most of the tows!

[stuboy]

Well back from Sauze d'Oulx now and I must say the snow was excellent. They had a 50cm dumping before I left and this made conditions perfect. There were a few flurries whilst I was there but the weather was mostly sunny except for one cloudy day. I was disappointed not to see some heavy snow whilst I was there, however I can't complain about what was an excellent holiday. I will try and attach some pictures of the village and slopes before the end of today.

Edited January 18, 2010 by stuboy

[J10]

http://forum.netweather.tv/topic/60635-alps-forecast-12/

Latest Skiing Forecast Blog Now out

[yukichon]

Im off to Pas De La Casa at the begining of March, am a bit concerned about temps this time of year that far south , most of the skiing inc. the resort is 2000m + , will the conditions be fairly cold at this altitude still ?

[J10]

http://forum.netweather.tv/topic/60836-alps-forecast-13/page__pid__1757059__st__0entry1757059

The latest Ski forecast was issued yesterday. and a very cold weekend over the Alps is very likely with further snow in places, right down to resort level.

[J10]

Current snow depths at our featured resorts, In Brackets on 6th January

France

Val d'Isere 100/146cm (90cm/150cm), Last Snow 20cm 30 Jan Powder Conditions

Meribel 85cm/142cm (60cm/115cm), Last Snow 25cm 30 Jan Powder Conditions

Switzerland

Wengen 45cm/115cm (23cm/80cm), Last Snow 20cm 30 Jan Powder Conditions

Austria

Niederau 45cm/90cm (35cm/70cm), Last Snow 5cm 29 Jan Excellent/Powder

Italy

Sestriere / Sauze d'Oulx 100cm/180cm (80cm/120cm), Last Snow 20cm 26 Jan Good/Varied

Im off to Pas De La Casa at the begining of March, am a bit concerned about temps this time of year that far south , most of the skiing inc. the resort is 2000m + , will the conditions be fairly cold at this altitude still ?

Where is Pas De La Cesa?

[J10]

http://forum.netweather.tv/topic/61200-alps-forecast-14/

Latest Ski Blog Out

[yukichon]

Pas de la casa is in Andorra

[Snow Leopard]

First post on this thread and was wondering if anyone can help me. If I want to go skiing in the spring, eg April, where would I still find good skiing conditions in Europe/North America?

If anyone is interested in any tips, I spent a week in Northstar at Tahoe over the Christmas period. Great place, they had 96 inches of snow over 7 days last month.

[stuboy]

First post on this thread and was wondering if anyone can help me. If I want to go skiing in the spring, eg April, where would I still find good skiing conditions in Europe/North America?

If anyone is interested in any tips, I spent a week in Northstar at Tahoe over the Christmas period. Great place, they had 96 inches of snow over 7 days last month.

I went Skiing last April in Val Thorens, France. It's one of the highest resorts in Europe and therefore has the best likelihood of snow later in the season. However avoid the Easter holidays as it's very busy. The snow was ok last year but by the end of the week it was starting to get quite slushy due to higher temperatures. Failing that head to a resort with a glacier. e.g Kaprun in Austria. Sometimes it's a little journey to the glaciers in these resorts, but usually the snow is much better. Hope that helps a little!

[J10]

Pas de la casa is in Andorra

http://www.skiclub.co.uk/skiclub/skiresorts/resortintro.aspx/Pas-de-la-Casa-Grandvalira

From this, snow can be a problem ,however conditions are good there at the moment.

I went Skiing last April in Val Thorens, France. It's one of the highest resorts in Europe and therefore has the best likelihood of snow later in the season. However avoid the Easter holidays as it's very busy. The snow was ok last year but by the end of the week it was starting to get quite slushy due to higher temperatures. Failing that head to a resort with a glacier. e.g Kaprun in Austria. Sometimes it's a little journey to the glaciers in these resorts, but usually the snow is much better. Hope that helps a little!

Again cannot argue with that, the higher the better later in the season, and resorts with glaciers tend to do better.

[Snow Leopard]

Thanks for the advice. Unfortunately bound by my sons school holidays so will just have to cope with the crowds High and North I think it needs to be then. Canadian Rockies maybe?

[joo]

Do the same rules apply to snow forecasts in the Alps as snow forecasts in Britain? Ie forecasting anything more than an hour in advance is just guess work. Or are things more forecastable there and there's better confidence in forecasts?

[J10]

Do the same rules apply to snow forecasts in the Alps as snow forecasts in Britain? Ie forecasting anything more than an hour in advance is just guess work. Or are things more forecastable there and there's better confidence in forecasts?

Exact details are equally difficult to pinpoint, however there is one major difference, in the UK many snowfall events are marginal and happen a degree or so either side of freezing. In the Alps, snow often happens at well below freezing so the marginality problem isn't there.

But when talking about freezing levels, this can vary a bit and this can be a bit out.

[J10]

http://forum.netweather.tv/topic/61451-alps-forecast-15/

Latest Ski Blog Now Out

After recent heavy snow, a quiet weekend with some light snowfall in places.

[johnholmes]

Do the same rules apply to snow forecasts in the Alps as snow forecasts in Britain? Ie forecasting anything more than an hour in advance is just guess work. Or are things more forecastable there and there's better confidence in forecasts?

Forecasting weather in mountain areas is very difficult. Its not the problem, as Julian, comments on, of temperature, at heights of often above 4000ft for the major ski centres. Its simply forecasting for mountain areas is just very difficult. Topography is very important in precip forecasts, aspect, that is which was does a particular slope face, winds. Forecasting the freezing level is fairly easy and will it snow or not follows on from that. Weather models are usually at about 20-60km spread so minor differences are not easily brought out. Most ski countries have either a dedicated national forecast centre for the winter season or have specialist private centres. Partly they are needed to issue warnings of avalanches. Davos for example in Switzerland.