Norwegian Ski Resort On For Bumper Summer Season; Europe Freezes; Official Datasets Continually 'Find' More Warming; + Solar Maximum Is Near
"High risk of catastrophic frost."
Norwegian Ski Resort On For Bumper Summer Season
The Folgefonna Glacier in Norway is being readied for the upcoming summer season, which is expected to be a bumper one given winter and spring's record-challenging snowfall (the best since 2015, so far).
Fonna Glacier Ski Resort, one of only six ski resorts/areas in the world to open exclusively for the summer months, has seen "massive snowfalls this winter thanks to one of the coldest winters in decades," reports snowbrains.com.
In early-March, Fonna was digging out its ski lift following a monstrous snowstorm that dropped 10+ meters (33 feet). And thanks to favorable conditions ever since, skiing is "slated to be epic this summer".
Before the fun can ensue however, the roads leading to the glacier—inaccessible during the winter months—need to be cleared.
Work has started but it’s slow going, owing to the tremendous volumes of snow.
Crews have until May 1 to clear the passes, the scheduled opening date for the resort.
Eyeing east, to Finland, some exceptionally late 'ice days' are being registered there.
Turku Airport, for example, struggled to -0.4C (31.3F) on Sunday; Jokioinen Ilmala managed a daily high of just -1.5C (29.3F); with Tampere Pirkkala Airport reaching just -2.6C (27.3F) — the latter appears to have set a new coldest April low-max (in 44 years of record keeping at the locale), pipping the -2.5C (27.5F) set back on April 1, 1998.
"None of the weather stations in Finland rose above two degrees Celsius, not even the marine stations," writes Mika Rantanen, of the Finnish Meteorological Institute.
"Remarkable for this late in April."
Finland's cold has proved long-lasting, too.
Case in point: Sunday (April 21) marked the 200th day of 'thermal winter' in Sodankylä Tähtelä, Lapland (a period where the daily mean temperature holds below the freezing mark). This makes 2023-24 the longest winter since 1994-95, which lasted 215 days.
Snow cover is also proving historic in these parts, having now been on the ground since Oct 8, 2023 — one of the longest-ever stretches in books dating back to 1910.
And given Europe's ongoing freeze, which is set to run into May (more on that below), combined with the ≈70 cm (27.5 inches) of snow left on the ground, Tähtelä has a shot at breaking its all-time record-stretches for snow cover AND thermal winter, both of which stand at 231 days (Oct 5, 1968 - May 23, 1969).
Europe Freezes
It isn't just the far north enduring an extension of winter, cold and snow have returned to much of Europe. What forecasters had feared is now playing out: catastrophic frosts across the continent's growing regions, particularly central areas.
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