London, Europe Brief News – Sparse snow fall and unseasonably warm winter weather in Europe’s central mountains are allowing grass to blanket hillsides across the region, causing headaches for ski slope operators and aficionados of winter sports.
Patches of grass, rock and dirt were visible Monday in some of Europe’s skiing meccas, like Innsbruck in Austria, Villars-Sur-Ollon and Crans-Montana in Switzerland, and Germany’s Lenggries and far beyond. The dearth of snow has revived concerns about temperature upheaval linked to climate change.
On a swath stretching from France to Poland is enjoying short-sleeve weather. A weather map showed Poland racking daily highs in the double digits recently
It’s a sharp contrast to the frigid weather and blizzards in parts of the US late last year.
The shortage has been particularly burdensome around Switzerland’s Adelboden, which is set to host World Cup skiing on Saturday, and generally draws 25,000 fans for a single day of racing.
Resorts like these look for such races to offer up bucolic wintertime images to draw amateur skiers, but grassy, brown sides to the course can mar the landscape, and dampen the appeal.
Meteo France says the southern Alps and, in the northern Alps, slopes above 2,200 meters, have seen close to normal snowfalls. But snow is notably lacking at lower altitudes in the northern Alps and across the Pyrenees, it said.
