The forecast from yesterday remains on track, with consistent snowfall expected in the southern Alps through Saturday. The snow will be light to moderate for the most part, but heavier periods are possible, especially on Friday.

With a series of lows developing and hanging out over southwestern Europe, the flow into the Alps will be mainly out of the south. This will favor the southern Alps and result in dry, downsloping winds on the northern side for most of the week. As the low wobbles and is reinforced by other lows from the west and northeast, we’ll see a bit more of a westerly component in the southerly winds, allowing the southern and even northern French Alps to see some accumulating snow.

Overall, this won’t be a cold cycle, with snow levels generally hovering around 1500 m across the region. 

Below is the forecast from Wednesday through Friday morning.

As the next upper-level low drops down from the northeast, a piece of energy will eject TO the northeast from the low pressure over Spain. This will provide the juice for this period of heavy snow in the southern Alps. We should see 10 - 25 cm from this wave alone Thursday night through Friday.  

Additional light snow is expected Friday night through Sunday. Accumulations from Thursday night through Sunday are shown below. 

Below is the total snow accumulation during this period from the high-resolution WRF model.

A ridge is expected to build in over northern/central Europe next week, though some recent model runs are showing a cutoff low over the eastern Alps. The majority of the data shows a drier period, but I can’t rule out some additional snow showers next week. 

My next post will be on Thursday.

Thanks for reading the Europe Daily Snow!

Luke Stone
Forecaster, OpenSnow