A Skier wrote:While I completely appreciate that this may not be possible to answer I was wondering if you knew ... what the snow fall is likely to be like in St Mortiz over December?
...wondering if you had any long range forecast information as to determine whether you expected a good or bad year.
The question is a good (if familiar) one, but there's no good answer. There are just too many factors that influence the overall course of a winter, and many more that affect exactly where and when the snow falls.
The forecast models that we (and other weather sites) draw from are continually improved and are now really quite good on the short-term (48 to 72 hour timeframe) outlook. Long-range forecasting is very much more problematic.
There simply are no long-range forecasts available that can be relied upon with current science; if there were, we would be using them. 8)
Alpine winters often seem to arrive quite suddenly and the exact onset cannot be predicted. Last November was unusually dry in The Alps (though certainly not unprecedented), and December broke 100-year records for snowfall.
To date, this winter's looking reassuringly "normal"; autumn temperatures have varied both above and below the average, there have been some good snow falls, some clear weather and most conditions in between...
That all said, St.Moritz has a pretty good snow record and will have decent snow by mid-December in most years.
Will it this year? We don't know - and neither does anyone else. :D
Anyone who claims to know what the winter will be like is blagging. They may get lucky, or you may get a better forecast by rolling a dice...
That all said, Joe Bastardi seems to get lucky more often than most with his long-range general forecasts but even he's not infallible.
For anyone interested in the longer range indicators, then reading up on the influences of the Jetstream and the NAO (North Atlantic Oscillation) is worthwhile.
In the meantime, watch the forecasts develop on J2Ski; we're adding more locations for this winter and will be updating our snow report and forecast pages over the next few weeks.
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