Much of the Alps just don’t look right for this time of year. Sparse snowfall and unseasonably warm winter weather in Europe’s central mountains are allowing grass to blanket hillsides across the region.
MeteoSuisse quipped on its blog: “... this turn of the new year could almost make you forget that it’s the height of winter.”
The shortage has been particularly burdensome around Switzerland’s Adelboden, which is set to host World Cup skiing on Saturday, and generally draws 25,000 fans for a single day of racing. Resorts like these look for such races to offer up bucolic wintertime images to draw amateur skiers, but grassy, brown sides to the course can mar the landscape — and dampen the appeal.Course director Toni Hadi acknowledged that the race will be run on 100% artificial snow this year.
Next door in France, national weather agency Meteo France said 2022 ended with some of the warmest weather the country has ever experienced at this time of year -- capping an exceptionally warm year that saw temperature records broken and rampant forest fires and drought conditions.Meteo France says the southern Alps and, in the northern Alps, slopes above 2,200 meters, have seen close to normal snowfalls.
Early in the ski season, fortunes looked bright for snow lovers: In France, freezing weather into mid-December raised hopes that ski resorts in the Alps, the Pyrenees and elsewhere might see plenty of early snow and the lasting subzero temperatures needed to keep runs open.
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