J2Ski Forum Posts and Replies by admin

Zermatt (wanted to get there this year but failed), La Clusaz (as usual - home from home) and maybe Banff. Niederau appears to be compulsory for j2ski-ers so I'd better go there and see the Jan-Man at some point.

Oh, and Zinal, just to poach some of Ise's lines (although I think I've got a fat chance of beating him up the mountain without a heli-drop...). 8)

We've had some good ideas for additional information to add to our snow forecasts and reports, so here's a thread for you guys (and gals) to add some more.

Can't promise to implement them all (or even take them seriously :lol: ) but feel free to ask for anything you think would be useful to add.

Good suggestions received so far, that we will try to add, include :-

• Adding "wind-chill" to the forecast for each day.


• Adding a "confidence factor" reflecting how stable the forecast for a particular day has been.

One major change we plan is to provide a more detailed forecast for the next 48 hours; breaking down the weather into 6-hour chunks to give you an idea of what will happen when.

Any more bright ideas?

Just to pick up on this... we certainly aim for accuracy, but we are at the mercy both of the extreme variability inherent in mountain weather and the weaknesses in the forecast models we use.

twoshortplanks put his/her finger on one of the apparent GFS (Global Forecast System) model deficiencies - deviations in the model seem to be sometimes compounded with time-to-go; so the estimates of precipitation sometimes start out large (at 7 days) and fall progressively as the actual day approaches.

This effect seems to apply mostly to small snowfalls - the combination of our processing and the GFS model generally predicts the big dumps quite well, even from a week out.

We will be looking at this over the summer and looking at ways to minimise such deviations with our own post-processing of the raw GFS data.

Purely anecdotally, this last week we were out in Les Arcs; several minor snowfalls occurred throughout the week and our forecast generally over-stated these (e.g. predicting 5cm when 1cm actually fell). The major dump of the week (30cm+) on Friday was in our forecast from 7 days out, however, although the estimate bounced around between 20cm and 35cm as the day approached.

We've archived a huge amount of data from this season and will be crunching through it over the summer to compare the forecasts with actual reported snowfall... sad but true.

So when you're sunning yourself on a beach this summer, spare a thought for us snow-nerds slaving over hot servers and rarely seeing daylight... kinda like bears hibernating but with the seasons switched... 8)

Yet more snow arrived in The Alps late last week, leaving 30cm of fresh powder across much of the region. With low temperatures until the end of this week, conditions will continue to be good - excellent for the time of year.

Many of the higher resorts are still open until the end of this month and, with snow-pack depths now between 2 and 5 metres, will be great places to be next week with empty slopes and good snow. So if you can squeeze in a last minute break...


The Week Ahead

Temperatures will rise to more seasonal levels toward the end of this week, returning typical Spring conditions to most resorts below 2,000 metres. Significant precipitation looks likely at times next week, although it will fall as rain at low altitude. Ski areas above 2,000 metres will, again, see more powder days.


No need to un-subscribe your Weekly e-mail

For the majority of European resorts, we'll continue the weekly snow reports until the end of April and then give you a break until next season. For those of our subscribers monitoring the European summer skiing, and Southern Hemisphere, resorts - we'll continue the updates through the summer.

Thank you Hamish... and everyone else for your good wishes.

The Admin family are presently enjoying brilliant Spring skiing in Les Arcs (boot deep between the pistes above 2000, under clear blue skies today - doesn't get much better...).

I'll post some stoke a little later but need to apply the after-sun right now - truly lobstered today... :oops:

More snow in the forecast and Les Arcs open for a couple more weeks yet; it's not over yet here either! 8)

SaTrinxa wrote:Got all the gear into the Landrover and myself, the wife and 10 other close friends are heading for the Alps tommorrow night :lol:

For about half of us, including me (but not the Mrs) it's our first trip away to the slopes.

Really looking forward to it :lol:

Have a great trip - it's shaping up to be a memorable April so enjoy; should be quiet slopes and heaps of snow. We'll be in Les Arcs; how about you?

Tony_H wrote:Anyone got any useful tips about Geneva Airport, for example where to collect ski bags, if not the main carousel?

Skis and boards emerge from a "large baggage point" immediately on your right as you walk through passport control into the baggage reclaim area. Can't miss it.

As you're nice and early you should go straight through - the only hold-up might be if they only have one passport desk open at that time, but it's unlikely to take long whatever.

Enjoy Verbier!

We've suspended the ESF thread pending clarification of some of the claims made.

Whilst we welcome open discussion and constructive criticism we'd ask people to respect the fact that people's businesses and livelihood can be dramatically affected by such discussion.

Please - check your facts before posting and, if not providing a first-hand account, include a reference to an authoritative source for the claim.

We hope to release the thread again shortly.

Thanks for your understanding.