Winter "2 months shorter" according to Meteo France

A snowHead

According to Meteo France winters are now "2 months shorter than average" compared to 1960 with a reduction of 50% in total annual snowfall in mid-mountain areas where most resorts have the bottom of their runs. The French State weather forecasting service has said that in 2006 autumn temperatures at 1000m were 3C above average and rainfall was between 40 to 60% below average. However Meteo France caution that lack of snow at the beginning of December is not unusual with eleven such starts to Winter since 1960.

The poor pre-season conditions are affecting package deals. Tour Operators have been offering fully catered chalet holidays from well under £100 pounds per person. We found a fully catered 7 day break for two for just £168 including flights and transfers at l’Alpe d’Huez. The resort has snow sure glacier skiing but don’t forget to pack the walking boots.

More Info
Poor Start to 2006 Winter – PisteHors.com

A snowHead

2 months shorter? Given most high resorts still seem to run Dec thru April, are they saying Winter used to start in October previously????

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

2 Months shorter than average? What a load of b*llocks - The tide will turn Smile

...it's just unfortunate weather at the moment snowHead

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Nice articles.

Weather, like most things in life, is cyclical. It goes up for a while. It goes down for a while. Broadly speaking, we appear to be in a cyclical downturn at present, within a range of minus 5% to 50% over the last 2 to 4 decades. Whether, or for how long, this trend continues in the future is anyone's guess.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

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brian

After all it is free

isn't it just that due to the warmth most of us are looking at webcams of brown, bare mountainsides instead of them being artifically covered up - providing a sense that regardless of mother-nature's mean streak with the early snow you would actually be able to get some turns in, and probably back to resort level too Confused

For the first time ever I have booked a ski holiday over 3 months before i actually go, rather than do a late look, does make you feel different I have to say Puzzled

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Synoptics/Synoptic Charts - http://www.west-cheshire.ac.uk/weather/charts.asp

With regards to the July Closures - just look at the snowfall totals for May & June between the years 68-77, it almost didn't happen. Those figures are in a table, copy them into Excel...only takes a couple of seconds.

Plotting a graph shows no trends really Puzzled

snow reports

Hezza

Re Mamouth.

Last year was their - I Quote " Biggest season " They were skiing until July 4th

Have you been to Mamaouth in July. Ihope you dont make a special trip becuse you think theres snow in abunndace?
You can find a strip of unmelted snow anywhere in the Alps in July.

This is just American resort marketing > earliest,deepest,biggest, longest,dryest blah blah blah .....

You know it makes sense.

Remember, you heard it on Snowheads first, folks.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

Winters are obviously very different for anyone over the age of 40. Daffodils used to come out in mid to late March when I was a kid, they were coming out here last week. Earlier than last year, but I can't remember the last time they came out in March. A month either side of the ski season may not be as far-fetched as it first appears.

Synoptics provide an overview of observed (and predicted) weather conditions. They don't actually affect the weather at all, so it can't really be 'synoptics' doing it. I imagine the distinction being made here is the one between climate and weather. The above debate over isolated events at Mammoth is a perfect example of weather, something happening in one place and over a shorter span of time. However, that's not to say that there isn't also some climate involved. Climate models predict that some places will get a lot more precipitation, so if the average temperature of a place is minus 15 and it warms by 5 degrees, increased precipitation is still going to fall as snow. The atmospheric rivers they are getting on the west coast do appear to be becoming more potent as a consequence of a warmer pacific.

Climate looks at larger global trends over a longer span of time, not localised and relatively brief events. So one place you can look at global trends is sea surface temperatures. Large bodies of water don't change temperatures over night. But they are on the up at an incredibly fast pace. Over time sea level temps have remained relatively stable, in fact throughout most of the Holocene, which began at the end of the last ice age. Recently that stability has departed. And the change is very fast indeed. It has been warm in the Alps this winter, not because of some errant weather, but because the sea is ludicrously warm and any time its influence is felt the temp goes up. As the prevailing 'weather' comes from where the sea is things are rather troubling, especially as it's difficult to see where anything cold that will cool the ocean back down again is going to come from. It's quite extraordinary that so many people still refuse to accept what's happening and why it's happening.

People like Whitegold above just muddy the waters with inconsistent trolling. What's the bet the old 'never had it so good', 'doom cult hysteria' lines come out shortly. Saying that, the quip about synoptics and the gospel did make me laugh so they do have their uses.

Below some info about SSTs

https://climate.copernicus.eu/copernicus-2024-world-experienced-warmest-january-record

A snowHead

The Swiss Alps has had steadily reduced snowfall and now gets half the number of winter snow days compared to 1970*. We’re talking about a steady trend over 50 years that’s never happened before - over geological history this sort of climate change would usually take thousands of years, not half a century. It’s unprecedented. It’s not part of any cycle that’s ever happened before. So it seems reasonable to ask:

Is it like any natural climate cycle that’s ever happened before? No.
Is there any sign of it changing? No..
What will happen if it continues? Half current snowfall under 1000m within 20 years and 0C level rising from 850m to 1500m within 30 years.

*Swiss National Centre for Climate Services Report ’Snow Scarce Winters’

A snowHead

Kew reported winters were getting shorter years ago, on average days then weeks less at each end. Not so long ago you could forget about lawn mowing for three months. In southern England the advice now is to perhaps give it mow over ‘winter’. Nowt to do with skiing but indicative of the changes. I hold Met Office annual snow reports going back 70 plus years, full of data of sometimes substantial snow across the UK. Some huge seasons such as 47, 62/63, 78/79, 81/82, some barren ones in southern England in the 70’s. I don’t know if they even bother now.

It’s affecting our own ski trip planning. We lucked out with great snow at Rohrmoos-Untertal in the week before Xmas 2022 and 2023. On 23 December both times heavy rain came, for weeks now most days have maxed at +8c to +15c, most minima are above zero. Folk are skiing on slush. At over 1,000m in early Feb!

Next winter I’m going select higher altitude villages. I also wouldn’t getting into last minute flights and hotels, reacting to weather … not bound now by school holidays.

Help!!

Winter "2 months shorter" according to Meteo France

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