J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by J2SkiNews

Was in to see my doctor today - not coronavirus for me as yet, but something minor thankfully. It came up in conversation though and he said about a billion people around the world get flu each year and 750,000 people die of it. He said as far as he was aware everyone dying of coronavirus had underlying health issues/elderly - the type of people who usually die of flu. He was concerned that the panic about it could be more dangerous than the actual illness.

Thanks for putting me right on that one, it's really great to have your valuable input there. Have a lovely evening.

Ski areas on the more southerly side of the Alps have been seeing some big snowfalls over the past few days, to the delight of resort managers and skiers alike.

There have been four big snowstorms in as many weeks in the Alps, but most have tracked along the northern side of the mountains depositing most of the snow on ski areas at higher latitudes, leaving many just a short distance as the crow flies to the south with little or nothing.

But the past 24 hours has seen resorts that have largely missed out before reporting up to 50cm (20 inches) of snowfall in the last 24 hours.

Isola 2000 in the southern French Alps and Nassfeld in southern Austria are among areas reporting 30cm (a foot) of snow since Sunday, whilst Bardonecchia (pictured above) has reported 50cm of snowfall in the past 24 hours.

It is continuing to snow heavily in the northern Alps too where a number of areas have now reported more than a metre of snowfall in the past seven days.

Major events being staged in ski resorts ae exempt from a new Swiss national ban on events of more than 1,000 people, the organisers of one such upcoming event have announced.

The organisers of the SnowpenAir Festival, which markets itself as Switzerland's biggest music winter event staged more than 2000m up in the Jungfrau region, have issued a statement:

"The Snowpenair takes place: Coronavirus: The Swiss Federal Council has declared on 28.2.2020 that public transport, railway stations or ski resorts are not affected by the ban of large-scale events. The Jungfrau Railways operate normally."

The festival has previously seen stars including Joe Cocker, Laura Pausini, Uriah Heap and Bryan Adams performed on stage will this year takes place on April 4th and 5th.

Another larger music event will see veteran British band The Stranglers perform above Morgins on the Swiss side of the Portes du Soleil region on Saturday, 21st March as part of the Rock The Pistes festival.

Meanwhile a French ban on events of more than 5,000 people "in a confined space" does not appear to be likely to impact some of the big festivals, including the 25,000 people strong Tomorrowland winter due to take place in a fortnight's time in Alpe d'Huez, as they are not taking place in a confined space.

It's currently snowing hard in the Alps with ski areas reporting up to 75cm of snowfall in the past 24 hours and up to 90cm since the storm started on Tuesday.

The heaviest snowfall so far has been reported the Western Alps with Crans Montana in Switzerland posting 50cm of snowfall in the past 24 hours and La Rosiere in France, 45cm. Crans Montana also reported its 48 hour snow total at a metre, for La Rosiere that stat was 65cm.

It's snowing in parts of Austria and Italy too. Most resorts here are reporting 10-30cm so far, although parts of the Arlberg have had 45cm so far they say.

Updated stats are coming in all the time with the snowfall expected to continue into Friday and in many areas through the weekend and in to next week too, in some cases after a bit of a lull tomorrow.

It continues to look like a good number of higher, westerly located ski areas will pass the metre mark for 7-day snowfall totals by Monday and that the deepest base in Europe could climb up to 5 metres (It's been stick between 3.8 and 4.5 metres for the past few months).

The snowfall is causing low visibility and other issues leading to limited slope opening at many areas. Davos Klosters in Eastern Switzerland which hasn't seen much snow yet, was marketing itself on social media this morning on the grounds that it had "good weather". Meaning no fresh snow but the sun was out.

Another email in to J2Ski Editorial Offices this evening

SKI AREA PAGANELLA IS OPEN

At present, there is no Coronavirus affected person in Trentino and in Paganella. The situation is constantly monitored by local health authorities. In this period, all Trentino tourist resorts have recorded a strong presence of guests from the main European countries, who can ski on slopes with excellent snow cover and appreciate the renowned Trentino hospitality that is guaranteed by the professionalism and commitment of all the sector operators.

FIS Alpine Ski World Cup, La Thuile (ITA) Confirmed
Due to the outbreak and continuing spread of situation with the Novel Coronavirus in Northern Italy the majority of Italian Regional Authorities have taken the decision to cancel and postpone public including sports events, however this does not apply to the Aosta region, in which La Thuile is located where there are no recorded cases.
Consequently the Italian Winter Sports Federation (FISI) and its La Thuile Local Organising Committee in agreement with FIS can confirm that the women's Audi FIS World Cup races scheduled for 29th February- 1st March 2020 will go ahead as scheduled.
As a precaution in the interests of public health, the races this weekend will be staged with limited spectators.
The Italian athletes and teams are under permanent control and supervision of the FISI medical staff in order to guarantee their welfare.

Just how big a threat is Coronavirus (Covid 19) to skiers heading to (or back from) Italy, or indeed the wider Alps region?

There appears to be confusion over whether skiers should be concerned, and whether they should be doing anything; not helped by mainstream media reports of school parties returning from region going in to 'self-isolation' and having their schools 'deep-cleaned'.

One problem is that the fast-changing advice referred initially to 11 Italian towns being in lock down, that weren't ski areas, but close to some, but has now been expanded to 'northern Italy' in general and a particularly vague "Everywhere north of Pisa" which could cover a large part of the northern hemisphere, depending on whether there's an upper limit as we head north.

Another problem is that different governments in different countries appear to be giving different advice.

And travel companies and travel insurance companies are reported to have different approaches, some allowing easy changes to travel plans, others less keen. Travel insurance companies generally seems to saying no pay outs for travel plan changes until not travelling to a region is official government advice (and then that they may not pay out anyway as something resulting from government action is not covered).

However the current advice (at time of writing, noon on Wednesday 26th February) from the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), the Department of Health & Social Care and Public Health England (PHE) seems to be crucially that anyone returning from "the region" should only "self-isolate" for a fortnight if they develop any flu like symptoms. They should also call the NHS on 111 immediately.

One group who have been given this advice were schools and families returning from the English Alpine Championships in Bormio last week, once again, which saw a record number of participants.

Snowsport England said yesterday that they had had no reports of any symptoms amongst those who attended and / or participated in the English Alpine Championships, but stressed,

"Whilst we reiterate that no cases have been identified amongst those who travelled to Bormio, the health of individual competitors, volunteers and families are obviously of the highest priority."

There are a number of major skiing competitions scheduled in Italy over the coming month and its currently unclear what will happen with them all. However the Europa Cup Speed Finals in Sella Nevea, Italy, which had been scheduled to take place the first week of March, have been cancelled.

See also this thread for more inside info from J2skiers: https://www.j2ski.com/ski-chat-forum/posts/list/0/19284/italy-skiing-coronavirus-worried.page;jsessionid=B59F9C62B4E14CB7A5A11AD78CDBFA38#159904