Too warm, too little snow, high electricity prices – this has consequences for ski areas throughout Europe. The change in the winter sports world has begun.
Paul Linke
Hardly any snow in this ski resort near the French village of Bessans.AFP/JEAN-PHILIPPE KSIAZEK
Old snow, blood snow, slab snow, foul snow, felt snow, firn, windblown snow, crust, wind crust, melted crust, broken crust, industrial snow, artificial snow, avalanche snow, loose snow, wet snow, fresh snow, cardboard snow, powder snow, floating snow, corn, drift snow or cold, extremely loose snow , low-cohesion wild snow composed of very small crystals.
That’s quite a lot, but not all German words for the different forms of existence of snow. Incidentally, the fact that the Inuit (formerly Eskimos) know hundreds of snow words is a persistent hoax. And even the snow-experienced mountain people of the Austrians don’t even come close to this fantasy mark. There is a word there – plus in Switzerland and parts of southern Germany – that describes the absence of snow in a wonderfully monosyllabic way: aper.
The new year starts with temperature records
Apere ski areas, i.e. green mountain slopes and a few mostly technically produced white snow bands in between, are not an idyllic winter postcard motif as we know it from the past. They represent a heating present where January pretends to be March. The new year began with temperature records in several European countries, for example in the Netherlands, Denmark, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Belarus.
Warm winters and skiing or snowboarding at plus degrees were common in the past. But seldom has there been so much concern among the operators of slopes and cable cars, hotels and restaurants that future cold spells could be too short for their business. A business that has already suffered badly at Christmas, when around twenty percent of the annual turnover is generated. And that doesn’t even include the expensive electricity for the snow cannons or the heated lifts or the radiant heaters in front of the hut. Will après-ski soon be aper-ski?
“Turn your skis into firewood and go to the cellar to cry”
“In the very near future, profitable skiing will no longer be possible, especially at lower altitudes,” predicts the German Association for the Environment and Nature Conservation. The boundary between “What should we do without snow?” and “We’re still snow-sure” runs in the Alps at about 1500 meters above sea level. Indications of a fundamental change can already be found: In Switzerland, the first ski areas have announced that they will cease operations until further notice, Austria reports serious and fatal accidents because there are no snow-covered fall areas, some communities in Bavaria now call themselves “mountaineering villages” and not more “ski resorts”. The responsible economics minister, Hubert Aiwanger, told Deutschlandfunk: “We cannot tell people: stay at home with your children. Make firewood out of your skis and go to the cellar to cry.”
Tears will flow above all from people who will no longer be able to afford the already expensive to elite winter sports in the future. Ski pass prices have increased by around ten percent across Europe compared to the previous season. Trend: of course not falling. For everyone else, the increased use of snow cannons means that there could be a lack of water, for example in electricity production. Welcome to the new Aper class.