Portes du Soleil 2022/2023 - Avoriaz/Morzine/Les Gets/Chatel/Swiss Side etc.

A snowHead

I’m seeing up to 10 Celsius too. Minimum 4-6 Celsius at night.

And as has been said a thaw, even a small one, could have a big impact without some more snow.

A snowHead

It’ll be fine - it was actually fine at new year if you thought about where to go and it was fine all season last year when it didn’t snow much after the december dump. If “not fine” is -10° and fresh powder every day then ok, it’s not going to be fine - but other than some grotty bits in Switzerland (that are nearly always grotty) a few days of a few degrees above zero aren’t going to be catastrophic. And signs of some cooler and maybe unsettled weather after the middle of next week.

Be reet.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

Yes early next week is 10c at 1200m in Châtel. It drops again from Wednesday. Much better than rain we had for a day during last 2 feb half terms. Impact will be minimal as there is a lot of snow on higher slopes and on lower pistes with snow making. Avoriaz currently reporting 2.7m while VT has 1.8m. Kids will be happy not having to wear bin bags and we will be drinking rose at lunch. Vive Les PDS!!

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I’m quite looking forward to some warmer weather if I’m honest. A bit fed up with living in a freezer (-10 at 1000m this morning).

Potentially some spring snow on south faces.

The lower slopes on will suffer badly though. As for snow making, I’m told much of the area has already used its available water supply.

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Hi, apologies for the newbie question - I'm heading out to Avoriaz on the 25th for a week - Taking the missus and kids on their first trip, very excited! But looking at the long range forecast its looking very warm leading upto when we go - Is Avoriaz high enough to withstand those temperatures? Or are we looking at poor conditions? Any advice greatly appreciated...

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@alfgrey,

Avoriaz will be great. I was last there about 2.5 weeks ago. It has great snow cover and lots of North Facing slopes so keeps its snow well. I know it well as used to live there.
Dont forget to take swimming costumes as Aquariaz (fun pool) a nice change for for the kids after their ski lessons. There also is a bowling alley if you are looking for something to do after skiing.

Have a great trip.

Can personally recommend Avoriaz Alpine Ski School

After all it is free

Ahhh what a huge relief, thank you for replying!

Very jealous you used to live there too! I skiied in Morzine with pals a few years back and stopped in Avoriaz for lunch one day, I knew straight away it was where I wanted the family to come for their first trip. Picking my skis up from a service and wax tonight, cant f*%&$ng wait for the 25th to arrive!

Will make enquires with AASS too.

Thanks again for your help!

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We’ve not long got back from Aquariaz this evening. Drove up from Morzine. Kids loved it. I found it a bit cold for my liking (no pleasing some people!).

Snow cannons have been on constantly around “skiing hours” from what we have seen. Snow piles all over the place, which I’m sure will be used for the next few weeks. Feeling is that piste snow will be fine for all the holiday weeks and there are currently very few runs that are suffering in Morzine/Les Gets. But I’m in Courmayeur at the start of March and imo it would be really good if everywhere got a good top up of the natural stuff by then Very Happy

But for this week, skiing has been great, 5 year old having a blast, everybody happy, so all good!

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Good to hear there were still snow cannons going! Hopefully that was not only on Avoriaz but also for Morzine/Les Gets? Staying in Les Gets from the 25th and don’t want to drive up to Avoriaz again, like we had to do over New Year…not even mentioning those terrible queues…

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@Mjit, @Ormie31,

My suspicion is that Aquariaz deliberatly keep the water temp just a little bit low so that people dont dwell too long inside.

Just long enough for th kids to have fun, adults get cold and then wrap up and get out of there.

You know it makes sense.

Part of sobriété énergetique… french government policy has been to drop heating in public buildings and pools by a degree or two as a response to the energy crisis. Can’t remember the exact figures but sounds like it’s definitely in place in Avoriaz!

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

A snowHead

@Dutchie, I’m in Morzine from 24th my daughter is working in Les gets this season .
She said new year was very hard for guests Eh oh!

A snowHead

That was very hard indeed. We are coming for revenge, but not sure it is gonna be as we expected or at least hoped…

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Hi,
Would any of the resident meteosayers care to give some opinions on the prospects in PDS as we come out of French holiday season and into early March?
Thanks in anticipation....

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Les Gets was solid this weekend, but noticably worse end of day today vs yesterday. Very mushy afternoon, and pistes without snowmaking don't look good without a top up after this hot week.

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@polo, Hope you're ok. Where'd you go? Confused

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@shep, I was wondering the same thing - Polo was all over the weather before our trip in Jan - he's gone missing this last while - hope all is ok

After all it is free

Am just about alive. 3 weeks of visitors, liver is toast. Did multiple PdS mini circuits, all good. Never realized how important edges are to long days of piste sliding until I updated my 8 year old plank recently to a Bateleon “Whatever”, went 5cm shorter than the old rock hopper and it’s made a huge difference to on piste enjoyment.

Am using the early spring weather to hit the garden, already planting and planning. Won’t be up to LG until after mid term, and maybe not until fresh snow, to see if this thing really can ride ‘whatever’.

Brief glance at models doesn’t show anything near term, maybe the strat will help into the new month to shift the limpet high over France. There will be more snow for sure at some point (first shot possibly 22-23rd) but am focused elsewhere for a while.

Visitors - nice when they come, nice when they go Twisted Evil

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@polo, Glad to hear it - your absence had been noted!

I sharpened the Warpig before heading out in Jan and the difference was astounding - didn't wash out even once - little bit twitchy at first but perhaps I sharpened a bit too close past the contact points.
Anyways, good to see you back.

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My take on the outlook.....as usual it's important not to cherry pick the more favourable charts, so I'll give a balanced view even if it's not ideal.
Am running out of motivation to post more frequently though in general, so worth re-iterating that anyone interested can easily find the charts themselves and form their own view. There really isn't any magic or deep knowledge required, keep an eye on the mean anomaly charts (meteociel) and the direction of the isobars as they run between large areas of high/low pressure. In order of preference it's N, NW, NE, E, W. The more N / NW the better for snow, the more from E is better for cold, but drier. W is obviously wet and mild, and S is generally mild-warm (but can favour southern alps).

First the SSW is happening today, ie zonal winds in the strat are negative (net easterly) and temperatures 20 miles up are 50c above normal. So this is a major shock to the status quo, but there is only a 50% chance historically of an SSW leading to cold over western europe. In addition, it normally takes several weeks to see any effect. Sometimes there is a quick tropospheric response (QTR) but it's rare. The good news is this kind of shock to the system can impact the weather here for a month or so. March therefore is the earliest I would expect to see any notable impact, but you'd have to keep an eye on the various atmospheric layers to see if there is enough downwelling of the pattern from the strat to reach the trop. About all you can say right now is that March has more potential than usual to see high lattitude blocking and cold / snow to mid lattitudes.

In the near term, the chances of decent snow end of next week have diminished slightly from a few days ago. This pattern of mid atlantic heights forming is either just the normal ebb and flow, or driven by MJO phase 7.....doesn't really matter what that is, suffice to say changes in the pacific can lead to european high pressure being pulled west or north. Unfortunately that only tells half the story as there seems to be a stubborn area of heights to our SE which will turn the flow back towards Iberia. As an aside low pressure west of Iberia has persistently messed up many good patterns this winter.....no idea what is causing this semi permanent feature, but let's hope it leaves soon, and doesn't feature again next year.

Here are the 3 main models for friday 24th (ECM, GFS, GEM), showing expected mean temp anomalies

As you can see the cold air is slipping SW due to combination of Iberia low and SE europe high.

Other models / Op runs paint a slighty better picture for temps end of next week (not all the same date).....UKMO, ICON, JMA, Navgem.

So there is still good chance of a widespread cold snap, and fresh snow, it's just that it has been downgraded on recent runs....still a little time left for a flip back for more widespread snow to hit the alps.

Summing up.....high pressure is forecast to set up just west of Ire in a weeks time, leading to NE cold and snow potential into central europe, but the flow may head too far SW (spain / portugal).
In the extended outlook, last days of Feb / early Mar, that high moves NE towards Scotland, leading to more of an easterly flow for alps....so would be on the cooler side again.
BUT, with the models only starting to factor in the SSW base state from today, and approx 2 week lag for any impact, we should expect more flux than normal in the output, and ideally look out for heights to migrate NW towards Greenland and unleash some proper northerly flow into europe. That's the plan, but will need a large slice of luck.

Good to see GFS 06z sticking to it's guns, starting thurs 23rd and continuing into weekend.....hopefully leading the ECM this time.....will know for sure by tomorrow. Wouldn't pay much attention to snow amounts, if we get low enough pressure over us, it will snow enough to ride some freshies.

Freeze level:

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@polo, Lots of people are reading this I'm sure - and I for one really appreciated all your information before I went out in Jan.
What do you think is the main reason for such a lack of snow this year - and last. The US seems to be rocking and Europe, well we all know the situation here.
I had thought of even doing a week on a glacier in the summer last year to try and catch up a bit but that looked out of the question entirely - and perhaps again this year too.
Without being a tin foil hat person, is this really climate change I wonder or is it just 2 years on the trot that have been poor and next year will be epic?
Tea leaves anyone?

@elefantfresh, no one knows....and it's different for those living here vs one or two week visits. It has been dry, but there were several awesome days early on as well. It's certainly not going to rank as one of the worst seasons ever, as there are examples of such as far back as the 60's. For the last month we've enjoyed decent piste skiiing to low levels in cool sunny weather, which is most peoples ideal. I reckon it's one of the cooler winters so far in recent memory, even including the heatwave around turn of the year.

Don't get me started on climate change....I have some blatantly different views to the majority here...while it's clear that temps have risen significantly over the last 30 odd years, they seem to have plateaued since about 2014. My main point has been I don't believe it's carbon driven, but best to leave that discussion to all the apres experts Cool

Now sunspots...that's a thing....and the last 2 years we are in the rising stage of a new solar cycle, so it might be a few years before we get a more favourable background from that. You could also say it's a westerly QBO year....meaning more likely to be mild or dry over europe. This signal will alernate back to easterly next winter or the one after. But you can never say which single factor is driving the weather in any season as it's a complex mix of so many things (ENSO etc).....or just all random for an area as small as the alps.

Either way, it could be worse....and may be about to get very good again into March.....I've skied fresh snow in Les Gets as late as 23rd May Very Happy

Now, am off to enjoy the lovely weather outside....stuff to do

You know it makes sense.

GFS currently the "best" of the model runs. Best in that it's showing precipitation and colder temps around 23rd / 24th of the month Very Happy

Temperatures don't drop until the precipitation arrives though so may be rain turning to snow if that's how it pans out. Still far away in FA and the other models aren't in agreement yet but it's probably the next event to keep an eye on...

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A snowHead

@Dashed, yep it’s an extraordinary divergence at close range. You meant FI instead of FA, but ironically it will Sweet FA if ECM is right, as it keeps shifting further and further west and pumping up much warmer air.

Normally I would say it’s all over at this point but UKMO is still showing a hit for the alps.

I expect this to get resolved tomorrow, probably a half way house which would still likely be a little too far west

A snowHead

@polo, Aye, it's an interesting one for sure. 12z runs are mainly showing some degree of precipitation across all the models (on the stuff I'm looking at) but wide divergence in the ensembles on all of them. There is also no agreement on temps yet either so could be anything from snow to village level to rain to the top! Interesting few days ahead in forecasting terms!

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oooh.....I'm watching this with interest now
Regardless of what happens over the next month, do you think a few glacier days are probably out of the question this summer?
I've never done this but I'd assume summer needs a decent winter before it.

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@elefantfresh, no, glaciers not out of the question yet because there are 4-5 months of snow to come

I've only been up to Cervinia in summer (end of July), after a typical winter, and it was great fun....ski from 8 to 11 at about 3500m, then come down to 2500m and mountain bike in the afternoon. Did this in Avoriaz in June once as well but obviously a very rare event being almost 1500m lower and technically not a glacier

Anyway I was wrong about the modelling for next week, it didn't get resolved today. All over the place, never seen such divergence at relatively short range, and I doubt it has anything to do with the SSW as that doesn't downwell / imprint until the week after. Various models are struggling with how much energy gets over the atlantic ridge and subsequently breaks down the remaining high over northern europe. I guess tomorrow we'll know a little more.

Will we get this....snowmageddon nord stau

Or this.....damaging wet muck from the south west

One thing that is looking more certain, again note the irony that it's much further away, high pressure will head north of Scotland soon after, and then the real fun starts as the SSW is starting to show up on the trop having travelled down some 15 miles by then....high pressure retrogressing towards Greenland and the main polar vortex switching to the asian side. This is the plan. My interest is at 11.

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@polo, thanks for your continued insight. Cliffhanger - can't wait for the next episode.
Cheers.

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@polo, thanks for your continued insight. Cliffhanger - can't wait for the next episode.
Cheers.

Then you can post your own questions or snow reports...

Been looking at the verification stats for the various models and GFS clearly suffered after its upgrade pre xmas but seems to have been tweaked enough now to make a huge recovery in recent weeks. Bottom line is 5 or 6 models are now showing good results at 5 days out (90% accurate on average) so it's worth watching as many as possible. If we do get snow for a few days in the NW end of the week then it's a big win for GFS and UKMO, while ECM and GEM will hang their heads in shame. Still it might be the other way around on the next event so the more data you look at the better the odds of making a good call.

All observations refer to the NW alps:

ICON drops a feeble low into west france....not ideal
UKMO similar but follows up with northerly Fri/Sat.....very snowy
GFS scores a direct hit, snow 22-25th, been remarkably consistent
GEM starts too far west but gets across eventually, pretty good
JMA also starts west and fizzles out, not much snow
ECM too far west but does produce some goods on Friday
Navgem another direct hit, 3-4 days of snow to low levels

So it's likely that the low will drop west at first, leading to a mild start for any ppn. Odds are also building that enough low pressure will follow to bring snow to much of the alps, favouring the southern side as some kind of genoa low is likely (IF enough low pressure makes it to the alps).

Easier to visualize on these total ppn charts. ECM really is out on its own being so far west as to leave the alps mostly dry. While some models are showing 2-3m on the southern side (Cervinia / Aosta). This link is for 9 days, so you'd have to shorten the end date to pick up other models like UKMO.

https://meteologix.com/fr/model-charts/swiss-mrf/france/accumulated-precipitation/20230226-1800z.html

No change in the extended outlook, it's going to remain cold into early March with high pressure to our north and an easterly undercut. Plenty of SSW drama appearing on the ensembles in FI but no point analyzing that until we get thru next week. If we just consider the main two models for a moment, then I'll be amazed if GFS back tracks west now having been so consistent in the build up. And I'll be equally amazed if ECM ends up anywhere near what GFS has been modelling with a direct hit. I suppose the likely consensus would be a weak low coming in mild, followed by a day or two of decent snow...I'll stick my neck out and say 20cm at 1400m by next weekend, with the caveat that it could 5, or 35 as the outliers

After all it is free

@polo, Thank you for the glacier information - I shall bring my thoughts and questions on that topic to another thread in the forums
Keep up the wonderful work on the weather - you should be getting more kudos on here

@elefantfresh, no bother....and not really seeking kudos, just sometimes motivated or not depending on if I need more snow, if there are very interesting charts, or in general to share knowledge / encourage others to do their own research.

So a massive back track by the GFS in particular towards ECM for thurs-fri. But as is often the case when models are split over two very different outcomes, you can end up with both outcomes being more or less right, just the timing is off, ie you get outcome 1 quickly followed by outcome 2 a day or two later.

In this case it was surprising that pretty much the entire GFS ensemble suite was way off, and persistently so over a long build up. It's only when you get to about day 5 that differences finally get resolved, although it can of course happen further out, ie consensus at days 6 to 8. Look at the huge shift in GFS ensembles here from -5c (yesterday) to almost +5c in less than 24hours.

A very unusual occurence (even UKMO was wrong), but shows once again that you can't rely on one or two models, no matter how consistent and self supported (ensembles) they appear, esp beyond day 5.

So we've got the weak low sinking west into Iberia on wed/thurs, doing its usual frustrating pattern wreck of advecting warm air towards the alps from the SW.....1500m temps of +4 likely. And while GFS and a few others keep it mild in the NW alps thru the weekend it's not unanimous as several models are still keen to bring down some N or NE flow fri/sat

ICON, NAV, JMA, GEM, ECM

Quite a mixed picture still, as 2 models stlll have the Iberian low (sick of it) preventing the northerly cold reaching us. 2 show direct hits, and ECM has the NE flow. So it's still 50/50 in my view. Eastern end probably higher odds as things stand, but it should still return cold into the following week either way across the alps.

It would be unlucky if we don't get some good snow by sunday....but too many variables to make a confident call.

In any case this is all just a precursor to the real fireworks in early March. The SSW has created a huge block over Greenland and trough over Russia / Europe way up in the strat (20 miles above). And there are now clear signs that show this pattern downwelling thru the atmospheric layers....it's still far away, but early March is showing up with some coupling / imprinting right down to 500 hpa (our weather).

Could easily be a miss of course (what chances the low that can not be mentioned will still be there to wreck the potential), or there could be some historic march snowfall and freezing temps in the making. Worth repeating that this pattern is unlikely to be a quickly passing one chance and gone situation.....it's got potential to last for weeks (high lat blocking).

Big fan of what the GFS is doing out in fantasy island

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Is anyone there at the moment who can attest to what the pistes are like? I know it's 6 days away, but we arrive on Saturday and am feeling a bit worried about the brown patches! Doing a snow dance

Help!!

Portes du Soleil 2022/2023 - Avoriaz/Morzine/Les Gets/Chatel/Swiss Side etc.

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