Lea Hartl

Every two years, the International Snow Science Workshop (ISSW) brings together scientists and practitioners from a wide range of different, but always snow-related, subject areas. New findings and research results are presented in various thematic blocks - so-called sessions. We break the whole thing down into more or less digestible morsels and summarize the sessions of the ISSW2018 for you every two weeks.

With yesterday's cold front, winter has returned, at least at higher altitudes, and the Sahara-dusty Föhn period has come to an end. Today's Saturday will start relatively friendly but cool, at least in the east, and the next front will approach from the northwest towards the evening, bringing the next wave of precipitation on Sunday night.

Since last season, Black Diamond has had two re-labelled Pieps avalanche transceivers in its range: the Guide BT and the Reckon BT. The BD Guide BT corresponds to the Pieps Pro BT, the BD Reckon BT to the Pieps Powder BT. Guide/Pro and Reckon/Powder are the successors to the Pieps DSP Pro and Pieps DSP Sport respectively, i.e. the "top model" in the line-up (Guide/Pro) and the slightly slimmed-down, cheaper version (Reckon/Powder/Sport). The BD devices differ from the Pieps models only in colour.

Spring is progressing rapidly, but has to pause for breath: Cool air of polar origin is reaching the Alps from the north-east and it is getting fresh again with snowfall limits in some of the higher valleys. Maybe it's better to wait a few more days with the summer tires!

A strong low pressure system is approaching the Alpine region from the west and a southerly flow is developing in front of the trough with Föhn on the northern slopes of the Alps and increasing accumulating precipitation in the south. Today, Wednesday, it is already snowing heavily in the west, while in the east it is still mostly dry, at least in the north, with a strong Föhn wind.

A large-scale weather situation of the "anticyclonic north" type brings sunshine (therefore anticyclonic) with relatively cool temperatures (because of the northerly flow). Good conditions to make the most of the little fresh snow of the last few days with the best touring weather!

It's the beginning of spring again! This time in the astronomical sense, meaning that the sun is vertical above the equator today and day and night are the same length everywhere. The weather is sticking to the calendar and ensuring sunny mountain weather and - hopefully - firn fun

It's going to be a turbulent week - the PowderAlert has already announced it. One front chases the next, all bringing precipitation, initially with relatively cool temperatures.

The interplay of windy, warmer, colder, sunny and wet continues. Embedded in a strong westerly current, new disturbances are constantly reaching the Alps. Small changes in the direction of flow on both sides of the Alps sometimes lead to foehn, then again to accumulating precipitation.

If you don't have air support or a skido and want to ski in the Alaska Range, you have to be satisfied with a very limited selection of possible destinations. Especially if it is to be a day tour, at best without touching complicated glaciers.

The meteorological winter is coming to an end (the skiing winter is still a long way off, of course!) and with it, the permanent high that has dominated the Alpine weather for what feels like half an eternity is slowly coming to an end.

Today's somewhat changeable weather - changeable in the sense of "there are a few clouds" - is only short-lived. Dorit, last week's high, is moving away to the east, but high Erika is already waiting in the wings.