The outbreak of cold air that brings us late winter is caused by high air pressure over Scandinavia. The high there has docked diagonally to the Azores High and is guiding air from the north-east towards the south-west on its eastern flank in accordance with the direction of rotation, i.e. towards us. The opposite cog in the wheel is a small low in the Adriatic. Together, they are pumping in cold and partly humid air from continental, north-eastern climes and the crocuses are getting snowed on.
After a few centimetres of fresh snow overnight, clouds are still sticking around in the north today, Wednesday, but the main ridge may get over it and it's generally sunnier in the south with light foehn effects. With temperatures down to -20° at 3000m and a fresh wind, there's hardly any spring skiing feeling at the moment. Tomorrow it will be quite sunny everywhere at first, before clouds move in again from the north around midday. It will then snow from these clouds, more on the cosmetic scale, before disappearing again in the course of Friday.
In the western Alps, this small snowfall episode will probably be completely absent and it will also remain quite friendly south of the main Alpine ridge. Meanwhile, temperatures will gradually rise, but it will probably remain relatively cool until well into the weekend. From today's perspective, Saturday will be quite sunny in the north, but less so in the south. Sunday will tend to be more changeable and friendlier in the east than in the west, where there will probably be some fresh snow.
