Snow in the Alps, Pyrenees & Beyond…
30th September 2020
Last modified on May 14th, 2021
Storms have hit the much of the Pyrenees and the southern Alps. The weather has caused some severe flooding with fatalities and people reported missing in the mountains in Italy and France. Snow has fallen at altitude. UPDATED
Updated:
The storm has passed and we are being sent some stunning images from the Alps.
The videos are pretty tasty too.
Here’s the Kitzsteinhorn glacier above Kaprun in Austria that is currently open.
Onlangs geopend en dan nu deze prachtige skicondities vandaag op de Kitzssteinhorn-Kaprun (2600 meter). 60 cm verse sneeuw en er zijn 6 liften open. Lekkerrrr.^A.E#sneeuw #wintersport #zellamseekaprun pic.twitter.com/YFnF7GKaD9
— Alpenweerman (@Alpenweerman) October 8, 2020
Glacier Resorts in Excellent Condition after Fresh Snow
The latest pictures we have come from PlanetSKI reader and ski instructor, Toby Fishel, who lives in Austria.
He has been up on the Stubai glacier in the Tirol putting in a few early season turns.
Looking good Toby!
Stubai, the Tirol, Austria
Stubai, the Tirol, Austria
See the blog below as we tracked Storm Alex from its forecast last week, its falling at the weekend and now its passing.
Tuesday 6th October
The latest storm has topped up the glaciers areas nicely and left other resorts looking wintery.
There is glacier skiing in a handful of resorts in Austria.
Here’s Hintertux:
In Switzerland Glacier 3000 has opened early after the fresh snow and joins Zermatt and Saas-Fee that were already open.
In Italy Stelvio and Passi Senales are open with race teams in training.
In France all the resorts are shut but Les2Alpes and Tignes open on October 17th for some autumn skiing and snowboarding.
Elsewhere in the Alps the snow has made things look rather pretty.
Some further snow flurries are expected this week in the Alps and we’ll keep you posted.
And lets not forget skiing in Scandinavia.
Levi in Finland opened its front slope and some cross-country ski trails on Friday 2nd October with the help of some snow stored from last winter.
Sunday 4th October
The stormy weather has come at a cost.
Two people have died in the mountains in north Italy.
A 53-year old volunteer firefighter has died in the Aosta Valley and a 36-year-old man died when his car was swept into a river in the Piedmont region.
His brother managed to escape from the vehicle.
Another 11 people are said to be missing in the mountains after heavy overnight rain.
Up 450mm (17.7inches) of rain has fallen accompanied by high winds.
In the Piedmont region of Italy, several villages were cut off after the rains made roads impassable.
The storm also affected the north-western regions of Lombardy and Liguria.
In north-western Italy, flooding was described as “historic”.
The mayor of Ventimiglia on the Italy-France border, Gaetano Scullino, said “a disaster of this kind has not happened since 1958”.
In south east France 8 people are missing after flooding to the north of Nice.
The southern Alps region appeared the worst hit, with serious damage in the Roya, Tinée, Esteron and Vésubie valleys.
Saturday 3rd October
The latest storm has come from the west and hit the Pyrenees first.
Here’s Pas de la Casa in Andorra as the snow fell on Friday.
En 1h!
Pour les archives un 2 octobre 2020 📷 @juniormaniak #pasdelacasa #andorra pic.twitter.com/tbrQgqzVeK— Météo Pyrénées (@Meteo_Pyrenees) October 2, 2020
While here’s the scene on the Spanish side of the mountain range in the ski resort of Formigal.
Nevando en #Formigal!!! ❄️❄️❄️🎉🥳
·
📽️ @AramonFormigal [02/10/2020 12:34]
·
cc @nevasport @pyreneige_fr @Meteo_Pyrenees @meteo_aragon @GrupoAramon @meteoformigal @AEMET_Aragon @tiempobrasero pic.twitter.com/S8vXmvpo1V— infonieve.es (@infonieve) October 2, 2020
The storm has also now arrived in the Alps with some strong winds closing the lifts in ski resorts that are open.
Stubai in the Tirol in Austria is one of the handful of ski resorts open this month.
Not today.
“Unfortunately due to the strong wind, the ski resort is closed today, 3.10,” said the resort.
Stubai, Tirol, Austria
Kaunertal is another glacier resort in the Tirol that has opened, but is shut today.
“Lifts on the Kaunertal Glacier closed due to storms!” said the resort on Saturday morning
It is the same at Glacier 3000 in Switzerland that opened one run after the snow last weekend.
“The snow will return in the next few days at Glacier 3000. But the strong winds that accompany it force us to close in any case on October 2 and 3,” the resort said on Friday.
In the Alps on Friday there was some snow at altitude and snow is expected to fall lower down the mountains across the weekend as the temperatures drop.
Thursday 1st October
It likely won’t be as much as last weekend, but there should be some decent falls of snow above 2,000m and on the glaciers.
It follows the record-breaking autumn snow of last weekend across the Alps, with some decent falls in the Pyrenees too.
See the details of last weekend’s fall that has now clocked up almost 13,000 people reading it.
Ski Resorts Open as Massive Snowstorm Hits the Alps
Wednesday 30th September
How do we know about the new snow on its way?
Well, our good friend, Fraser Wilkin from Weathertoski said so earlier in the week.
He rarely gets it wrong.
“A major new storm is forecast for the end of this week, this time set to hit the southern and western Alps hardest.
“Temperatures won’t be as cold as last weekend, but significant snowfall is expected at altitude in places between Thursday and Saturday, especially in parts of the French Alps (e.g. Les 2 Alpes), the Italian Alps (e.g. Cervinia) and parts of the southern Swiss Alps (e.g. Zermatt and Saas-Fee).
“The rain/snow limit is expected to mostly stay between 2000m and 2700m during this storm but will lower to 1500m or so in places on Saturday.”
See further details on weathertoski.co.uk
The storm will also bring large quantities of rain that will affect the ski resorts and other areas of the mountains.
There are expected to be storm and flood warnings.
Winter is ending in the southern hemisphere and approaching in the north.
It is one of those rare times when there is snow falling in ski areas across much of the world.
See more here:
Snow Falls around the world
And do check back later in the week when the snow arrives.
