The first snow showers reached Switzerland, for example the Bern area, late on Wednesday evening, before the Renate depression brought a lot of snow on Thursday.
Heavy snowfall is expected across Switzerland on Thursday afternoon and evening and on Friday night. With moderate to even high snowfall intensities, particularly in the evening hours, ten to 25 centimeters of fresh snow is likely to fall by Friday morning, and in some areas even up to 40 centimeters.
The reason for the large amount of fresh snow is the Renate depression. Polar cold air has affected large parts of Central Europe. From the North Atlantic, Renate is moving from France to Switzerland on Thursday. Meteoschweiz also warns of “heavy snowfall in the central and eastern Mittelland, in northwestern Switzerland as well as in the western Alps and in the Upper Valais”.
Meteoschweiz has published possible scenarios for the large amounts of new snow in the lowlands. The middle scenario (median) assumes that everyone gets a little snow. “We are currently assuming that ten to 25, and in some areas even up to 30 centimeters of fresh snow will fall, especially in the central and eastern Mittelland as well as in northwestern Switzerland, even at the lowest altitudes. At altitudes above around 800 meters up to 40 centimeters are possible.”
Meteo Switzerland: Uncertainties
There are still some uncertainties surrounding the trajectory of the aforementioned low. Depending on whether the low takes a slightly more northerly or southerly path over the Alps, the milder air at altitude travels a little further or less far to the northeast. This has a relatively large impact on the snowfall line and thus on the areas that can be affected by heavy snowfall.
Deep Renate also provides a lot of fresh snow in the Alps. According to the Meteoschweiz weather model, over half a meter of fresh snow could fall in the western Alps.
A look at the current avalanche bulletin from White Risk shows that there is a significant avalanche danger (level 3), especially in the Alpine region.
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