Lea Hartl

Just a few days ago, the Alps were still in a mild, westerly flow. There was precipitation, but unfortunately not in the right state of aggregation for the most part. What has changed?

Warm, unsettled westerly weather will dominate the Alpine region. With fresh winds and a high snow line, minor disturbances will keep moving through, initially on Friday night and Sunday. Otherwise, it will be reasonably bright and, as mentioned, warm. The westward slide will continue into next week. The possibility of a downstream development from the middle of next week offers some hope, but as usual this is still very uncertain.

Part 2 of the ISPO Report 2016: Pieps and Arva present new avalanche transceivers at ISPO, while the other manufacturers stick to their existing models. When it comes to airbags, various manufacturers are in a fierce race for the lightest system. Arcteryx and Arva are presenting airbag backpacks for the first time. Ortovox is now also using its own system.

Hurrah, it's snowing! The WeatherBlog has been skiing and the air has once again glistened so beautifully. We wonder why. Unfortunately, the glittering, original and organic snow produced in real clouds is not yet enough for skiing everywhere, so we also look at some interesting aspects of artificial snow production.

The Cascades stretch from southern British Columbia across the US states of Washington and Oregon to California. Most of the peaks barely reach the 3000m mark. All the more dominant are the high volcanoes that are embedded in the chain, above all the 4392m high Mount Rainier.

The WeatherBlog occasionally reads in The New Yorker magazine, which is usually as great as it is sometimes lengthy, and has found an interesting article there. It's about literary weather: the weather as meaningful plot background, stylistic device, novel character. Before weather forecasts were known, the weather was logically a direct manifestation of divine anger or pleasure. Where else could it come from? From the Greek legends of the gods to the Old Testament, the weather is angrily tossed around with thunder, lightning, wind, waves and the odd plague of locusts. Classics by Charles Dickens and the Brontë sisters would probably only be half as thick if the London fog and stormy weather of English upland moors had been given less of a supporting role.

The weather in Central Europe is currently divided into two parts. A sharp air mass boundary separates the north and east from the much milder south and west. The differences are particularly evident in Germany, where, for example, temperature differences of up to 20° were measured on Monday. In Werl (NRW), on the warm side, the daily maximum temperature was 5.5°C, while in Diepholz, 120 km away on the cold side, it was only -4.7°C. The Alps are on the warm side of the air mass boundary in a humid westerly current.

A powerful hurricane depression called Eckard has formed over Iceland. Between Eckard and a high pressure system over Scandinavia, the strong pressure difference is shoveling masses of warm subtropical air towards us and much further north. The North Pole reaches temperatures of almost 50° above average (equivalent to just above zero).

At the moment, some people are probably wondering about the weather, which doesn't seem to fit in with the dream of a White Christmas. For example, the WeatherBlog received the following question: "Hi, can you explain when this warm and sunny bastard weather will disappear? And what does it have to do with climate change if it gets 2 degrees warmer overall? Why is it not -2 degrees in December instead of -5 degrees as it used to be, but +15 degrees for weeks on end? What does global warming have to do with the fact that in recent years we have often had a tendency towards a persistent mild south-westerly flow...?"

Unfortunately, the weather in the Alps continues to be rather stagnant and warm. A persistent trough in the North Atlantic is directing very warm air masses towards us. In the Alps, minor disturbances alternate with sunshine, while further north it has been and will continue to be very stormy (but still warm). A lasting change in the general weather situation is not in sight.

Avalanche accidents with injuries or even fatalities are rarely solely due to snowpack structure, terrain and weather. Rather, one particular element often plays the most important role: when people are traveling in groups, decisions are made that are not always the best ones and can end tragically in the worst case.

Apart from a few snowflakes today (Wednesday) and a not-so-spectacular cold front at the weekend, sunshine and mild temperatures are here to stay. On the occasion of the climate conference in Paris and because the weather outlook isn't particularly exciting, we're repeating a few basics today.