Bergwetter

A generally mild fall comes to a sunny but cold end. While the south-western Alps have received a decent base over the last week, the Föhn winds in the north have taken away most of the snow again. At least it is now cold enough again to run up all the available snow cannons and get the slopes in shape for the Christmas rush. In light of the current situation: What is artificial snow?

The Alps are on the edge of a Western European trough in a strong southerly current. While it snows on the southern slopes of the Alps, at least at high altitudes, the Föhn dominates in the north. How does the Föhn work again? And what's next for the weather?

After the passage of a warm front today, the current will turn to the southwest. While it will be very mild in the north with a föhn wind, precipitation will set in in the südstau. Further disturbances will follow at the weekend, bringing a lot of precipitation, especially in the south, but with a higher snow line than recently.

The Alps are caught in a north-westerly current that repeatedly brings disturbances to the Alps. From today, Wednesday, until Friday, there will be considerable amounts of fresh snow, especially in the west. From the weekend onwards, the forecasts are still rather uncertain. It will be milder but remain wet with a chance of an Italian low. We'll leave the details to the oracle this time, who will be in touch later today.

What was in short supply during the height of winter is now being made up for: With a strong push of cold air over Central Europe, the next late winter interlude is on the horizon for the weekend. Gardening enthusiasts should perhaps not put frost-sensitive plants outside just yet, while winter lovers will be delighted with the polar air expected by the models.

After a few dry, clear days, a change in the weather is on the horizon and fans of thunder and lightning are looking forward to the start of the thunderstorm season. The medium-term outlook is uncertain, but at least there is no threat of midsummer yet. Also: The Alpine Association presents its glacier report for the 2014/15 season.

The last few days have been rather frustrating in terms of skiing in large parts of the Alps. T-shirt temperatures in the valleys and T-shirt removal temperatures at many climbing crags, rapidly dwindling snow and increasingly brownish remnants of pistes have reduced the motivation for ski touring. Why is it not really freezing at night, even though the weather is somehow "nice"? Is it going to get cold again and what's next?

The next few days will bring changeable, mild, often foehn-like weather in the north. In the south, it will be cloudy and wet, possibly with late base-building for the alpine touring season. Also: On the occasion of World Weather Day, the WMO warns us to face the challenges of the future.

In contrast to the rest of the winter so far, the Alps have been in a north-easterly flow for a while now (apart from a few foehns), which brings relatively cool weather. Most recently, a drop of cold air paid us a visit. What's it all about and why are we not feeling the otherwise frequent Atlantic influence at the moment?

The WeatherBlog has stumbled across some strange conspiracy theories and is calling for reflection and not believing everything on the internet. It's a bit like the supposedly waist-deep snow on Instagram that only reaches as far as the second buckle on your ski boots. What's more, the ECMWF now has a powerful computer and is better at forecasting.

The meteorological winter (December, January, February) has been over since Monday. In Austria, it went down in the statistics as the second warmest winter in recorded history at 2.7° above the long-term average, and in Germany it was also 3.4° warmer than the average. In Austria, only 2006/07 was warmer, 2013/14 was just as warm. This means that five of the 10 warmest winters in the 250-year measurement history have occurred in the last 10 years. Nevertheless, and because the weather is known to not always stick to the calendar, it was, is and will be relatively wintry, at least in the mountains. We take a closer look at this below.

Last weekend was interesting in terms of weather and regrettable in terms of skiing. After heavy rain during the night, temperatures of around 20 degrees were measured in many places during the day on Sunday. The leader in Austria was Pottschach (Lower Austria) with 23.2° - a new national record for February. What was going on?