It's snowing
Tuesday October 13, 2009 - Email this article to a friend

It's been a strange month for weather in Austria with records tumbling.

Two weeks ago some places had the highest October temperatures recorded in recent times; on 7th October Vienna-Donaufeld recorded 28.6c which was the highest October temperature for 50 years.

Now it is snowing heavily in places.

St Anton, Lech, Zurs and a host of other resorts in the Arlberg and Tyrol are not open but report up 20cm of fresh snow.  In Central Switzerland the weather has eased off a bit but it is still raining in the town of Engelberg and that means snow up top. 

Further east in Davos, the highest major town in The Alps, the buildings were covered with a blanket of fresh snow and all the surrounding hills have turned white.

The Austrian glacier resorts are all closed due to high winds which is frustrating for the many athletes who are out there trying to train in advance of the season that starts in Solden in just a few weeks time.

Britain's number 1 male racer, Ed Drake, flew out to Pitztal this week but has now de-camped to an indoor slope in Winenburg, Germany with the British team to get some much needed slalom training in.  The weather should clear up by the weekend and the racers are hoping to resume their schedules then.

Murren, 2,970m

Meanwhile in Austria, there are predictions of snow down to 400m in the provincial capitals of Innsbruck, Salzburg and St Polten which would be the first time it has snowed this low before October 20th since records began.

Looking good in IschglIt hasn't happened yet but, with forecasters predicting it will happen towards the end of the week, it seems a distinct possibility.

Snow has already been falling down to as low as 1,200m in parts of the Austrian Alps.  In Vorarlberg it is compulsory for motorists to put chains on their vehicles in some places.

There have even been avalanche warnings with up to 40cm of snow falling.

For further images from around the Alps take a look at these web cam pictures that were taken earlier in the week.

Blue skies not storm cloudsBut the snowfall is most certainly not everywhere in The Alps.  A friend of PlanetSKI from the Performance Ski and Snowboard School in Verbier has posted an accurate and nicley understated comment.

"Whilst a lot of people are getting too excited too soon (and that’s fair enough) it’s safe to say that it’s a bit nippy out and we’ve very nearly had snow in resort. Nearly. But not actually.,"

The comments appear in the company's blog, and it pays a rather a nice tribute to us here at PlanetSKI too.

You might also like to read the thoughts on the US resorts "opening" in our content editor's latest blog here on PlanetSKI.

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