Zermatt Snow Report

We spent the morning on the Gornergrat sector with a coffee stop at the Riffelberg and a wonderful lunch at Alphitta. This afternoon we skied to the Sunnegga area via Gant and enjoyed a lovely run home via Patrullarve.

Sunny

High pressure has dominated the past week, leaving conditions fine and dry but with a distinct lack of snow and a freezing line dropping below 1,000m in many areas leaving resort bases in some lower locations with positive temperatures, affecting snow quality and the initially good snowpack from November and early December.

The jet stream will begin to change direction over the coming days, with the nordstau event over Austria ending and instead offering a direct west-to-east pattern over the Atlantic. This will bring an area of low pressure towards Europe, which, whilst expecting to stall and fade by the end of the week in the Bay of Biscay, will still blow some precipitation onto the Alps.

The Main Alpine Ridge and Grissons Alps will benefit most from this, with steady snow over Christmas. Some areas, such as the Bernese Oberland, will struggle, just missing out on this useful refresher of snow.

Extended Forecast: This change in jet stream direction is expected to continue throughout the last week in December, bringing significant precipitation off the Atlantic. This may bring steady snow over this period.