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Skiers left disappointed as snow steers clear of Swiss slopes

As if last year wasn't bad enough, a lack of snow at Alpine ski resorts during the Christmas period has left some slopes completely bare.

Published: 27 December 2016 13:33 CET
Skiers left disappointed as snow steers clear of Swiss slopes
A lack of snow has left Swiss ski slopes bare again this season. Photo: Fabrice Coffrini/AFP

And as temperatures rise to unseasonable highs, there is little sign of much snow falling before the end of the year.

Several resorts, including the popular Charmey, where no snow has fallen since December 19th, have closed due to the mild weather. The situation is much the same as the 2015 season, when snow didn't arrive until the middle of January.

Temperatures in the Ticino region hit 20.9 degrees Celsius on Christmas Day, the highest recorded in 40 years, according to Meteonews.

In Valais and Graubünden, which border Italy, temperatures reached between 12 and 15 degrees Celsius, while they were around nine degrees Celsius in the lower lying regions north of the Alps.

2016 has been one of the ten warmest since Swiss records began in 1864, MeteoSuisse reported on Friday.

As a whole the year was 0.6-0.7 degrees warmer than normal across Switzerland, the federal weather office said in its round-up of the year's weather, earning 2016 a place in the top ten mildest years on record.

Switzerland’s temperatures are in line with the global trend, with 2016 set to be the hottest year on record across the world,  the World Meteorological Organization said in November. 

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WEATHER

IN PICTURES: ‘Exceptional’ Sahara dust cloud hits Europe

An "exceptional" dust cloud from the Sahara is choking parts of Europe, the continent's climate monitor said on Monday, causing poor air quality and coating windows and cars in grime.

Published: 8 April 2024 14:15 CEST
IN PICTURES: 'Exceptional' Sahara dust cloud hits Europe

Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service said the latest plume, the third of its kind in recent weeks, was bringing hazy conditions to southern Europe and would sweep northward as far as Scandinavia.

Mark Parrington, senior scientist at Copernicus, said the latest event was related to a weather pattern that has brought warmer weather to parts of Europe in recent days.

“While it is not unusual for Saharan dust plumes to reach Europe, there has been an increase in the intensity and frequency of such episodes in recent years, which could be potentially attributed to changes in atmospheric circulation patterns,” he said.

This latest episode has caused air quality to deteriorate in several countries, Copernicus said.

The European Union’s safe threshold for concentrations of PM10 — coarser particles like sand and dust that that can irritate the nose and throat — has already been exceeded in some locations.

A picture taken on April 8, 2024 shows a rapeseed field under thick sand dust blown in from the Sahara, giving the sky a yellowish appearance near Daillens, western Switzerland. – An “exceptional” dust cloud from the Sahara is choking parts of Europe, the continent’s climate monitor said, causing poor air quality and coating windows and cars in grime. (Photo by Fabrice COFFRINI / AFP)

The worst affected was the Iberian Peninsula in Spain but lesser air pollution spikes were also recorded in parts of Switzerland, France and Germany.

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Local authorities in southeastern and southern France announced that the air pollution threshold was breached on Saturday.

They advised residents to avoid intense physical activity, particularly those with heart or respiratory problems.

The dust outbreak was expected to reach Sweden, Finland and northwest Russia before ending on Tuesday with a shift in weather patterns, Copernicus said.

The Sahara emits between 60 and 200 million tonnes of fine dust every year, which can travel thousands of kilometres (miles), carried by winds and certain meteorological conditions.

The Spanish Canary Islands off the coast of northwest Africa saw just 12 days within a 90-day period from December to February where skies were free of Saharan dust, the local weather agency Aemet had reported.

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