Last week a significant amount of snow fell above 1,500 metres, as is the case here in Sölden (Photo: Jeroen Elferink)
A lot of snow has fallen regularly in the Alps in recent weeks. Switzerland and Austria in particular were lucky in November. As a result, many ski areas opened earlier. This weekend, there will be a lot of snow again, this time even in low-lying ski areas.
On Friday, the first area of snow will enter the Alps, coming from Germany. During the day, the snow line remains between 1000 meters in the Eastern Alps and 1500 meters in the Western Alps. During the day, and especially tonight, the snow line drops to 600 meters and later across Switzerland and northern Austria. It even turns white in lower places like Innsbruck or Sion.
Over the weekend, heavy snow will continue to fall on the north side. In popular ski areas such as Saas-Fee, Davos or St. Anton am Arlberg, between 50 and 100 centimeters of snow will fall. In these ski areas, there is already a lot of snow in the mountains, and the snow layer is only being renewed. In lower ski areas such as Adelboden or Westendorf, the lower Alpine pastures are still green this Friday. Here, 30 to 60 cm often falls in the valleys, while a larger amount falls on the mountaintops.
Cold winter sports weather will remain in the Alps even after the weekend. Unfortunately, there is almost no snow in the Southern Alps such as the Dolomites or Carinthia. But snow cannons can handle the cold here.
Closer to home, in the Black Forest or Sauerland, a thick layer of snow also falls. It will be nice and white here too, in Winterberg it will easily fall 30cm of snow. Combined with the cold, which means snow cannons can be used, the ski slopes here will open smoothly.
