July 2022

Issued: 27th July 2022 By Patrick "Snowhunter" Thorne Southern Hemisphere European Roundup North American Roundup Asia Roundup World Overview We are into the final few days of having ski lifts operational and serving snow slopes on six continents. There are a few weeks of the season left, hopefully, for the only area open in North America. But for Asia, the last centre open in Japan will end its 2022 run at the weekend.In Europe, ski areas are never supposed to close with two centres operating glacier slopes year-round, but limited snowfall last winter followed by a hot spring and summer has put that under pressure. One of the two, Zermatt, with its summer glacier slopes accessed from Cervinia on the Italian…

Issued: 20th July 2022 By Patrick "Snowhunter" Thorne Southern Hemisphere European Roundup North American Roundup Asia Roundup World Overview Cardrona resort this week Chile and New Zealand have been the big stories of the past seven days for snowfall, although Argentina and Australia have seen plenty of fresh snow falling too. Chile was the most dramatically affected with heavy snow becoming more of a logistical issue at the end of last week as numerous mountain passes and access roads to most of the country’s leading resorts were closed. Obviously, great news for snow cover for the rest of the season but a problem caused in the short term. In New Zealand, ski areas on the South Island were closed for several…

Former British Olympic skier and TV presenter Chemmy Alcott has spent the past week, the first seven days of her 40s, wearing the rubbish she created. Chemmy was challenged to wear her rubbish for a week by circular skiwear company EcoSki in a bid to highlight the amount we send to landfill and its impact on climate change. Mum-of-three Chemmy, who turned 40 on 10 July, wore recycled plastic bags filled with the rubbish she “throws out” over the course of a week while attending events in London, doing the school run and even while out paddleboarding. On the final day she weighed it all and found her rubbish at the end of the week was 4.5kg, 100 grammes more…

A ski area in Vermont formerly known as ‘Hill No.6’ and more recently ‘Suicide Six’ has changed its name again to Saskadena Six. The name change, announced as coming soon last month, is the latest of several attempts to remove insensitive business titles and follows the decision to rename the better-known Californian ski area and 1960 Winter Olympics host ‘Squaw Valley’ as ‘Palisades Tahoe’. The word “squaw” is considered a racist slur by many people and using “suicide” considered insensitive when the number of people taking their own lives in Vermont is at a record high. Saskadena (pronounced “sahs-kah-deena), which means ‘standing mountain’ recognises that the land was originally inhabited by the  Abenaki people before Europeans arrived and took it.…

Issued: 13th July 2022 By Patrick "Snowhunter" Thorne Southern Hemisphere European Roundup North American Roundup Asia Roundup World Overview Very different pictures from both sides of the world as we move deeper into winter/summer …depending on which hemisphere you’re looking at. In the southern hemisphere, it's an increasingly good picture with more snowfall reported. This last week it's the Andes that are really seeing the most significant accumulations and the first taste of real Andean powder of the season at several centres. In Australia and New Zealand, it's been more a case of further snowfalls improving a mostly already good season start. In the northern hemisphere, however, the picture is a quite sad one of ever more glacier areas in the…