There has been a further spate of heavy snow showers in northwestern North America with ski areas in California, BC and Alberta reporting up to 90cm of snow in 72 hours.
The storm has about passed in the last few hours in most areas meaning that a number of resorts will soon be waking up to deep snow conditions.
Amongst them, Whistler Blackcomb, which opens for its 2017-18 ski season, five days early thanks to the favourable conditions, today.
Lake Louise in Alberta has already been open for 10 days and it has reported 45cm/18 inches of fresh snow and now has 50 runs open. It's pictured above a few hours ago. It also has the go ahead from the FIS to stage World Cup races over the two weekends after this following a positive snow control report.
South of the border Mammoth Mountain claims 30-60cm of fresh snow at the base and summit respectively and Mt Bachelor in Oregon says it will have its earliest opening for over a decade tomorrow.
Jasckson Hole in Wyoming has just passed the '100 inches of snowfall so far this season' stat even though it hasn't actually started its season yet. It measures snowfall from September 1st but opens for the season a week tomorrow.
It's believed that more than 60 ski areas will be open across North America this coming weekend, possibly as many as 100, as smaller centres in the Midwest in particular take advantage of cold weather to post their earliest openings in four years or more, ahead of the busy Thanksgiving holiday weekend next week.
It is not all good news though, at least four ski areas in New Mexico, Colorado and Utah have delayed opening due to warm conditions preventing snowmaking and a lack of natural snowfall. They include Alta in Utah and Monarch in Colorado.