The 2019 summer ski season in France is over after Les 2 Alpes followed the move by Tignes and finished their summer ski opening sooner than expected.
Originally the resort, which claims to operate the largest skiable glacier in the Alps, said it expected its summer ski season to run from June 22nd to August 25th, but it appears its last day for summer snowsports was last Thursday, August 8th. The resort had said the end of August target date was subject to conditions.
The French Alps have had another hot summer, hitting record high temperatures in July day and night, and even at the glacier height of 3200m temperatures are currently 9-13C and the snow, still reported to be lying 145cm thick, is soft.
Les 2 Alpes has had to end its summer season earlier than expected on several occasions in recent years, and to cancel a planned end-of-October annual week's glacier opening for ski demos and competitions.
There are still three ski areas in France that open for summer glacier skiing (down from around eight in the 1990s) but the summer seasons have got shorter and shorter.
Val d'Isere had a small area open for about a month from early June to early July and Tignes operated from late June to late July, closing a week earlier than planned itself. It had aimed to stay open in to August so that it could claim to be open at least a part of every month of the year. Its winter season runs from September to May, the longest in France, although last year it did not make the September opening due to inadequate snow cover.
Six glaciers remain open in Europe - Saas Fee and Zermatt in Switzerland, Cervinia and Passo Stelvio in Italy and Hintertux and Molltal in Austria.