Heavy Snow In The Alps
Friday, September 3rd, 2010
A remarkable series of heavy snowfalls has brought up to two feet (60cm) of new snow to the higher slopes of the Alps, raising expectations for the coming winter. Indeed at some glacier ski areas, the 2010-11 season will begin in just a few weeks!
The heavy snowfall was particularly intense over Austrian glaciers, several of which are currently open for summer skiing. The Tux glacier near Mayrhofen received more than a foot of new snow causing snow reporting agency www.skiinfo.co.uk to issue powder alarms to surprised subscribers to its snow alert email network earlier this week. The alarms are triggered every time there’s a snowfall of 20cm or more in 24 hours.
In Switzerland Saas Fee and Zermatt are open for summer skiing too. In Saas Fee’s case it will remain open through to next May while Zermatt’s glacier is open for snow sports all year round.
In Italy Cervinia is open this week but closes at the weekend, however Val Senales is currently open and was one of those reporting more than 50cm of new snow.
Solden is reported to be one of the ski area’s considering opening a month earlier than planned – next Friday, 10th September, after they reported 60cm (two feet) of new snow. Otherwise the first area that’s scheduled to open for 10-11 this month is the Pitztal Glacier, which run’s Austria’s highest lifts and has a special plus-temperatures snowmaking system it can use when needed. It is scheduled to open on Wednesday, September 15th.
A week after that Tignes is due to open, the first (and for several months only) ski area in France to offer snow sports until others start to open in late November.
Over in America some fresh snow has been reported on the peaks in the West too, although not in the East where it has been very hot for the past week. Loveland in Colorado, traditionally one of the first ski areas in the country to open each winter, often in early October, and one of the world’s 10 highest ski areas, has wheeled out its portable snow making equipment ready for temperatures to drop far enough to start making snow.
The season is still going strong in most of the southern hemisphere too. Resorts in New Zealand received up to 30cm of snow in 30 hours last week, while several Australian ski areas posted their best snowfall in August for 25 years. In South America one resort in Argentina has seen its accumulated snow base pass 3.3 metres (11 feet).
