A lack of snow has meant a bumpy start to Australia’s alpine ski season but forecasters and resorts are hoping expected snowfalls on Sunday will kickstart the season.
The ski season started earlier this month with very little actual skiing, thanks to dry conditions, with snow machines working overtime at resorts in recent days.
On Friday, Thredbo resort in the NSW Snowy Mountains told customers it wouldn’t be opening for skiing and snowboarding this weekend despite 25cm of snow falling earlier in the week.
But the Bureau of Meteorology says a cold front is moving across the alpine region and is forecasting about 20cm of snow will fall on Sunday in welcome news for skiers and snowboarders.
In Victoria, the ABC reported Mount Hotham and Falls Creek resorts got their ski lifts moving for the first time on Friday after a dump of snow earlier in the week.
Mt Buller resort has said it was one of the few places in the state to be offering skiing at the start of the season “thanks to a month-long effort of snowmaking”.
According to Weatherzone, the start of June had seen “lacklustre snow cover” but the rest of the month could see two good periods of snowfall.
Angus Hines, a senior meteorologist at the Bureau of Meteorology, said it had been a “tough start” to the season which traditionally kicks off around the King’s Birthday public holiday weekend.
“As we moved into that weekend there wasn’t much natural snow around and it was a bit of a dry start,” he said.
“There was a decent dump of snow last week and some areas reported 27cm, but there’s more on the way starting on Sunday and going into Monday.”
Hines said two cold fronts would cross the alpine region over the next two days that would bring “about 20cm of fresh snow” with some isolated spots getting as much as 40cm over the next few days.
The second cold front on Monday would drop temperatures down to levels helpful for snow-making machines, but would also see dry conditions.
Hines said: “After Sunday it will be cool for another day or two so there could be snow production in the first half of next week.”
By next Thursday and Friday, Hines said the current forecasts were looking good for more snowfalls.
“It’s a little early for actual numbers but it could be similar to what we’re going to see over the next few days,” he said.
Hines said there were some snowfalls in May but these were not a good indicator of the ski season to come.
On Saturday, Perisher resort in Kosciuszko national park in NSW said it was expecting “some great snow days” to come with a cold front heading over the area from Sunday.
On social media on Friday, Thredbo resort said: “Fingers, toes … Every body part is crossed! We can’t wait for everyone to be skiing and snowboarding soon.”
Rod Peile, president of the Southern Alps Ski Club, said snow that had fallen in May had been supplemented by snow-making. “But in the week prior to the season it was warm and all that was washed away,” he said.
“It isn’t unusual to have poor conditions at the start of the season,” he said, but climate change appeared to be making conditions harder to predict.
A UN climate report last year said observations at Spencers Creek in NSW showed the snow season had already shortened by 5% and snow depth had dropped by 10%. Several other locations were also experiencing long-term falls in snow depth.
The Australian government’s official State of the Climate report, compiled by CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology, says maximum snow depth has been declining in Australia’s alpine regions since the 1950s.
