Last Saturday was, let's just say, the most interesting day in the WeatherBlog's ski instructor career for a long time. Even getting out of the car in the pouring rain proved difficult for the entire team due to a lack of motivation. A few hundred meters up the gondola later, it was still almost as warm and still pouring, to the particular delight of those colleagues whose workplace is located on the magic carpet next to the gondola. Only at around 1800 m, at the top lift in the area, could the precipitation be described as snow with a bit of good will.
Last weekend's heavy precipitation
There was also a lot of feedback from people who were freeriding rather than working that weekend: "Wow, the snow is like cement and it's not getting any better at the top!" Apart from the warm air mass, the strong wind was to blame for the high snow line and the not only perceived, but also actually low temperature gradient between the valley and the mountain. The lower layers of the atmosphere were completely mixed into a damp and mild uniform mash. In terms of quantity, last weekend's precipitation in the Eastern Alps was more than considerable, in some places more fell in 48 hours than in the whole of January.
End of the western weather?
As far as the future is concerned, there is once again a chance of an end to the westerly drift and slightly more wintry temperatures. Off the European Atlantic coast, a high pressure system is about to throw up a decent wedge. Such a wedge would block the western highway and disturbances from the west would be diverted far to the north. If the western influence is stopped in this way, cold polar air can take hold of Europe. How long winter will stay with us is still rather uncertain and, in principle, the wave could still shift so that we end up on the warm side again, but a certain amount of hope is probably not entirely unjustified in this case. On the subject of the end of the westerly weather, we once again recommend the blog by Manfred Spazierer, who explains it all in wonderful detail. Otherwise, the Alps are still in a northerly flow. A cold front will reach us on Thursday, which should bring fresh snow by Friday morning, especially in the north. South of the main Alpine ridge, partly sunny with north föhn. The development towards the weekend is still quite uncertain, it is likely to become "unstable" and colder throughout the Alpine region.
