Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Snow Report

Lots More Sun in the Alpine Forecast

Our latest Snow Report soaks up some of the Alpine sunshine and enjoys the generally excellent mid-March conditions.
Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Tignes, this morning, where the snow is 157-270cm deep. Photo: tignes.net

For the most part, the week has got off to a sunny and magnificent start in the Alps. It’s seven days since the last snow fell in most places; but there’s still three metres of the stuff packed down at the top of some resorts, and thanks to low-ish temperatures it’s in good nick, given the time of year.

On north-facing slopes, you can still find powder off-piste, as well as consistently soft and grippy snow on the groomed runs. Meanwhile, on south-facing slopes (and many east- and west-facing ones too), the snow is going through a daily melt-freeze cycle. That means hard-packed pistes first thing each morning, which will soften slowly through the day. Off-piste there’s a hard crust on many slopes which can also be skied as it softens – but unless you’re a real spring-skiing expert, you’ll need to hire a guide to show you where and when this can be done.

The deepest snow is generally in the French Alps and western Switzerland, but the Austrian Arlberg also has great cover – as does the East Tirol and much of Italy. This is all thanks to heavy snow between February 28 and March 6.

The avalanche risk is now moderate in most areas at 2/5. The freezing point is low for the time of year, at 1500m, but the strong sun is affecting slopes higher up than that.

There is one exception to the sunny picture this morning. In the south-western resorts of the Italian Alps, it’s been snowing over the last 24 hours. Here’s how it’s looking in Limone at the moment, which reports 5cm of new snow overnight.

Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Photo: riservabianca.it

And this is Sauze d’Oulx.

Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Photo: vialattea.it

Elsewhere, the sun is blazing in many resorts, as you’ll see from the webcam shots, below.

Pictured below is Ischgl in Austria, where the snow is 30-135cm deep.

Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Photo: ischgl.com

This is high-altitude Obergurgl, which has 37-204cm of settled cover.

Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Photo: obergurgl.com

Below is Zell am See, further east in Austria. Up high on the Kitzsteinhorn glacier there’s two metres of cover, but as you’ll see, in the valleys, spring has a much firmer grip on conditions – although 100% of runs on the lower slopes are still open.

Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Photo: zellamsee-kaprun.com

Pictured below is the magnificent scene in Madonna di Campiglio in the Brenta Dolomites, where there’s 90-180cm of cover.

Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Photo: funiviecampiglio.it

Below is Verbier, where’s there’s 40-250cm of settled snow.

Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Photo: verbier.ch

Pictured below is Courchevel this morning, where the snow is 150-200cm deep.

Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Photo: courchevel.com

And this is Serre-Chevalier, where there’s 30-170cm of settled cover.

Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Photo: serre-chevalier.com

Looking ahead, the generally sunny outlook will be interrupted on Wednesday, when a weak cold front will reach the Alps from the north-east. It’ll bring light snow to Austria and parts of Switzerland and the Dolomites, and then combine with a weather system in the western Med, to produce much heavier falls over the south-western resorts of Italy.

This is our current snow forcast for Wednesday.

Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
The latest Welove2ski snow map for March 16.

However, right across the region, the week will finish with more sunshine.

 

 

Meanwhile in North America…

Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Photo: Paul Morrison/Whistler Blackcomb/Facebook
The west coast is being walloped at the moment. North of the border, Whistler has had a lovely run of medium-sized snowstorms which have added up to 142cm in the last seven days. The season total is now at 1142cm of snow, and the mid-mountain snowpack is a whopping 375cm deep. It’s cold too. On the top half of the mountain a high of -6C is expected today.

South of the border, California is having another big-snow moment to add to the one that hit the region a week ago. On Sunday morning, Sugar Bowl reported 50cm of new snow, Squaw had 46cm and Kirkwood 45cm – and there’s a lot more to come before the clouds lift later today.

Here’s now it was looking at Northstar yesterday morning.

Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Photo: Northstar/Facebook

And this was the scene at Sugar Bowl.

Lots More Sunshine in the Alpine Forecast | Welove2ski
Photo: sugarbowl.com

There’ll be snow inland this week, too. Utah is expecting 15-45cm of snow on Monday night, and there are likely to be several days of snow in northern Colorado and the northern American Rockies too.

I’ll be back with a full snow report on Thursday.

About the author

Sean Newsom

As well as founding Welove2ski in June 2007, Sean has written about skiing and snowboarding in the British press for 28 years. For the last 20 of them, he’s also been the ski travel editor at The Sunday Times.

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