There's snow in the forecast!

The end of an unprecedented mild period is near. The weather in the Alps is more like mid-April than the end of February right now. It becomes even more bizarre on Wednesday, with a temperature that quickly reaches 12 or more degrees ABOVE normal at 850 hPa. That’s at an altitude of about 1350 meters. The day is over on southern slopes by 1 PM, or you should really love riding slush. It’s pretty crazy. Glide snow avalanches as the biggest danger during high season…

Nevertheless, I was riding powder again today, but I must say that it required a lot of work. A strong wind has influenced the snow cover in the high alpine, so that’s not really the place tob be anymore. Sunny faces are having a hard time as well. Even above 2000 meters you’ll have to search for powder. Southern slopes are completely wet during the day and even eastern and western slopes suffer from the heat and the sun. But a bit lower on the mountain, on steep northern slopes, preferably a beautiful forest, the snow is still fresh and powdery. The trees hold the cold air and keep the radiation of the sun away. It requires a lot of thinking, searching, and searching, but with the help of the exposition and gradient maps on wePowder Pro, I scored some cold powder in a small but nice area where there are no lift lines. After my first stop in Styria I thought that I could find some pow in this small inneralpine ski area and I was right.

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Mild up to and including Thursday

It remains mild in the Alps until Thursday. It is true that the air temperature decreases slightly on Thursday, but because the air humidity increases it feels as warm as on Wednesday. It is a signal that there is a change in the weather.

Snow from Friday?

A front will head into the northwest of the Alps on Friday. Initially, the snow line is still high (around 1900 meters). It drops to 1400 meters later and will end around 1100 meters in the northwest and 700 meters in the northeast of the Alps on Saturday. Unfortunately, most of the precipitation has already fallen at the moment the drop in temperature starts. Saturday starts fresh, but in the course of Saturday it gets warm again fast and especially Sunday is too warm again for the time of the year. The freezing level goes back to 2000 meters during the weekend.

Enough for a PowderAlert?

There was about 20-50 cm of fresh snow in the northeast last Friday and that was enough for two days of fun in the powder. Are Saturday and Sunday going to be good again? Yes, there is enough coming down on Saturday to call it a powder day in the high alpine between Chambéry and Vorarlberg, but lower in the trees it is probably too little.

But you also have to pay attention. It becomes milder fast in the course of the Saturday and certainly on Sunday. Especially the Sunday is a difficult day with incoming wind and clouds. Expect a lot of avalanche activity and powder panic after so many days without powder.

Take it easy, it will be much better later next week. Trust me.

More details later. For now:

• zaterdag een poederdag in de noordwest

• volgende week gaat ouderwest kouder worden met sneeuw

• Saturday will be a powder day in the northwest

• Lower temperaturs and snowfall again next week

Stay stoked,
Morris