Heavy snowfall has been reported across the Alps and other parts of Europe over the past 24 hours, ending a largely dry week where skiers and boarders on the slopes for Christmas were able to enjoy great conditions after the last big snowfalls earlier in December.
Major resorts in the French Alps as well as ski areas in the Aosta Valley have reported up to a foot (30cm) of new snow in the past 24 hours including Chamonix, La Rosiere, Tignes, Les Arcs and many others. Cervinia and Courmayeur in Italy area also big winners as are Lech and St Anton in the Austrian Arlberg.
Coming on top of accumulations of more than two metres (seven feet) at many resorts already in December and with bases now passing three metres (ten feet) at resorts like Chamonix it appears that European ski areas are in good shape for the rest of the 2012 season, barring a sudden stop in snowfall and dramatic thaw.
...which is alas what has happened in Scotland with all five areas that had been open prior to Christmas forced to close due to lack of snow and/or gales after temperatures shot up to double figures for the third warmest Christmas on record. Fortunately the snow is now back and there's limited terrain open at Cairngorm and Nevis range with Glencoe also looking to reopen this weekend if conditions are good.
Elsewhere in Europe it's still looking good in most areas of the continent with Scandinavia also receiving regular snowfalls and resorts in Andorra and other are4as of the Pyrenees, which had perhaps the worst start to the season anywhere with very little natural snow and temperatures too warm for snowmaking right up to mid-December, now reporting base depths of 150 – 18-cm (5-6 feet).
There has been a turn around across the Atlantic though where November snowfalls had conditions looking great at the start of December when it was rather dire in Europe before the snow arrived. Both east and West USA have had a warm dry December leaving Colorado resorts with their lowest reported snow base since the 1990s and resorts inn normally snowy California as well as New England struggling to open runs – in a complete reverse of this time last year when they were reporting falls of up to five metres in a week.
Conditions are better in the North West of the continent where Alberta, BC, Alaska and Washington State resorts all have good bases and are fully open.