Falls Creek, Australia, great snow and 100% open!
Australia, Argentina and Chile are getting the goods.
The Snow Headlines - July 13th
- Argentina's Catedral ski area opens 75km of terrain - most in world right now.
- Les 2 Alpes and Val d'Isere end 2023 summer ski seasons.
- More heavy snowfalls in Australia, Perisher reports upper base over 1m mark.
- Saas Fee due to open to all for 23-24 season this weekend.
- Norway's Fonna glacier area closing.
Oh look, more snow in the forecast for Australia, New Zealand and South America
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World Overview
The southern hemisphere's ski season has been gathering pace further with more big snowfalls in Australia and decent dumps reported for parts of South America too.
The result is that the southern hemisphere's two biggest ski areas – Argentina's Catedral and Australia's Perisher – are the two largest areas open in the world at present.
It's an improving picture in New Zealand too with more consistently cold weather, but bases remain thin and open terrain is limited.
In the northern hemisphere, the summer heat is being felt on the 10 ski areas that were open this time last week in Japan, North America and Europe.
Asia's only centre has now closed, and the number of French areas open has dropped from three to one. And one of the two Scandinavian glaciers areas open has announced its season end will be Sunday. But on the upside Switzerland's Saas Fee says it will open for its 8-month 23-24 season from this coming weekend.
Southern Hemisphere
Australia
Australia has had another good week with 2-3 days of heavy snowfall (albeit delivered in blizzard conditions which closed lifts and slopes at times) bringing up to another half-metre accumulation.
Falls Creek is the latest Aussie ski area to report every lift running and every slope open, including those served by the resort's famous international lift, which only usually opens for limited periods, if at all, each winter.
Perisher though has the most terrain open – about 40km of runs, the second most in the world at present, and Australia's deepest reported snow at 110cm up top.
New Zealand
It's slow progress for New Zealand where the country continues to wait for a big snowstorm and consistently cold temperatures to really get winter 2023 going.
As it is it's been mostly dry, with just a few light snowfalls, and so what is open – not a lot in most areas so far unfortunately – is largely thanks to snowmaking. Some that lack the fire power like Mount Dobson are still waiting to open anything.
The best snowfalls in NZ have been have been on the North Island where Turoa on Mount Ruapehu reports a 115cm upper slope base and about a quarter of its runs open. Coronet Peak reports the most terrain open – more than 30km and three-quarters of its slopes – despite still having snow lying only 5-30cm (2-12") deep.
Argentina
All of Argentina's leading ski areas have now opened for the 2023 season and cold weather with fresh snowfall has led to a big improvement in conditions too.
That's most marked at the continent's largest ski area, Catedral near Bariloche, where the amount of open terrain has jumped to 80km (50 miles), about two-thirds of the entire area and the largest area open anywhere in the world at present by some margin.
Most other areas have smaller percentages of terrain open, except for Chapelco which is at 80% of its slopes open already, 30km out of the 36km maximum possible.
Chile
Conditions continue to improve in Chile with most of the country's ski areas now open and a good snowfall over the middle of this week bringing reports of up to 40cm of fresh cover by Thursday morning.
Temperatures have also been low at ski areas, rarely getting much above freezing and dropping to double digits below up high overnight.
Portillo in the north is reporting that its famous powder snow is currently abundant and Valle Nevado, currently with the most terrain open, says a further 10% of its slopes are now open.
Africa
There has been quite a lot of excitement in South Africa this week with extensive natural snowfall reaching places it doesn't usually, including big cities like Johannesburg. Sadly though, the country's only ski centre Tiffindell appears to be closed for good.
Lesotho's Afriski is open but only for tubing and 'snow play' with no ski lifts operating. The centre blames an inadequate and unreliable power supply.
Europe
Alps
The biggest weather factor for much of Europe at present is heat, and alpine valleys are seeing their fair share of this with highs reaching +30C at 1,000m altitude.
Up on glaciers, it's cooler but still reaching high single-plus figures Celsius at 3,000m altitude in the afternoon - so base depths are dropping.
Les 2 Alpes and Val d'Isere are reported to have ended their summer ski openings as scheduled last weekend so there are currently just four areas open in the Alps – one in each of the big four ski nations there – Tignes in France, Hintertux in Austria, Zermatt in Switzerland and Passo Stelvio in Italy.
Saas Fee is due to open for its 23-24 season on Saturday and says its summer ski slopes will be open to all from day one. Last summer the area had limited terrain only available for race team training and was closed to the public due to the poor conditions.
Scandinavia
Another of Scandinavia's three small summer ski centres has announced it's ending its 2023 run. Fonna says this coming weekend will be its last until 2024 leaving only Galdhopiggen open, aiming to remain so through to the autumn and still posting a 50-220cm base.
The weather has been a mix of rain, cloud and even some light snow showers at times. Temperatures are still dropping to freezing overnight, with daytime highs around +8C.
North America
Two ski areas remain open to the public in the US with a further two small areas – Copper Mountain in Colorado and the Blackcomb Glacier above Whistler in BC, Canada – offering private, mostly terrain park based – summer snow sports too.
Mammoth Mountain, now into the ninth month of its 22-23 season, is the only ski area left open in California. It has reduced operations further this week and now has limited terrain accessed solely from the Main lodge.
The Timberline summer ski area on the Palmer Snowfield on Mt Hood in Oregon also remains open.
In North America as in Europe some very warm temperatures have been reported, speeding the thaw of the remaining snow from last winter's huge accumulations.