Lars Oelmann

A decent dump is coming to the southwest of the Alps. It's still cold enough for powder and there's a lot of it coming down, so there's nothing wrong with a weekend in the south.

There's powder again and the old pattern is back. It's snowing, but it's getting warm. This time the warmth won't stop abruptly, but on Friday and Saturday the snow line will drop back to powdery regions, so you should still have some on Sunday. It's not going to be wild, but it's going to be decent. Just a normal alarm. It's almost a rarity this season.

There is finally cold powder again, unfortunately there is only an alert in the south-east, while in the north only small amounts fall just below the alert. The westernmost tips of France and Switzerland could be an exception.

OK, the Fenris wolf hasn't appeared in the maps yet, but what Ullr has planned for Monday looks slightly apocalyptic. 150cm and more have already fallen in the last two alarms. And Ullr thinks to himself: all good things come in threes, so he's going full throttle again at the end.

Let's get this out of the way: Yes, there will be a third alert for this storm sequence. For Part 1, I fled behind the main Alpine ridge because, as I wrote in the alert, it was supposed to push far over. It did, the rest of the storm behaved somewhat erratically due to the enormous high flow and apart from parts of the Valais, which get something with normal west or northwest winds, the larger amounts did not arrive in front of or behind the main ridge.

At least it looks as if things will continue to be lively after that, as the low pressure systems and their fronts will be in full swing in the brisk westerly flow. More on this in the paragraph on the medium term. It seems that there are only big snowfalls left this season and freeriders are happy to accept them, as they are good for building up the snowpack later and in the meantime you can finally have fun in the trees without a handbrake!

Ullr apparently no longer does it under quasi-apocalyptic amounts of snow and so he ponders: Which corner of the Alps is not yet far above average in terms of the base? He comes to the conclusion: Ah, western Italy! I'll send a retour d'est and do a few meters there too. As the god of skiers, there was too much wind and the snow line was too high for alarm 13, so he tweaks these settings too and the next mega dump is ready.

As announced, the time has come. We're in the middle of the rollercoaster and heading for the megaloop. The Ullr is sending squadron after squadron of damp, mild and cool air from the west towards the Alps and it's rattling around. There is a ray of hope in terms of the snow line, because this time it should look better in the Alps than last time. So maybe less puking and more fun on our wild ride!

After a somewhat surprising interim alert in the north, which also brought alarms, we're now off to Ullr Leisure Land and on a wild rollercoaster ride of alarms in the north-west, which will probably last until the end of the first week of January. And as is the way with rollercoasters, we'll all be wavering between cheering and throwing up. When it goes down, we cheer and when the snow line goes up, we feel bad...

It's getting warmer and everyone fears the worst, but Ullr comes back on stage with verve and roars: ARE YOU READY? If you don't know the allusion from the metal mockumentary "This is Spinal Tap", you're in luck:

Ullr is slowly saying goodbye to our beloved pattern of the weekend trough, but first sends his best wishes to the Eastern Alps!

No, I haven't seen the new Star Wars yet, but our all-time favorite movie called "Best early winter in ages" is going into the next round. It's 150-300% of the long-term average on the northern slope of the Swiss Alps and the rest of the northern slope of the Alps isn't doing too badly either. And it continues here until Monday!