ENSO

The WeatherBlog is currently receiving a lot of questions about El Niño, which is this year - or was it La Niña? What is all this again and what does it mean for the Alps? Haven't we covered this topic before? Yes, we have. To start with: there is still no clear, statistically definitive correlation between El Niño and the Alpine winter that anyone can agree on.

Every year, we wish for reliable announcements that the winter will be great, preferably including a great forecast for the long weekend when the ski trip is already booked. Every year there is no such thing. This week's WeatherBlog deals with the following question from PG reader Benny_Supernova: If you now combine that (last week's polar vortex topic) with a 65% chance of an upcoming "El Nino" in the Northern Hemisphere winter, what does that add up to? Another "hammer winter" in the Northern Alps (e.g. Innsbruck, where my best skiing buddy lives)?

You don't like to hear it, but the meteorological winter is rapidly coming to an end. The past three months have been more or less averagely cold, with an above-average amount of snow and extremely few hours of sunshine.