Oz/NZ 2025

OpenSnow's bug is back: a constant moisture flow to Mount Hutt creating 22" of new snow for the entire month of June.

It's interesting because the reports are not coming from the model; they claim to be from the website (with a timestamp), not an estimate.

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But here are actuals:

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This person cannot be bothered to even look at New Zealand Reports/Snowfall History - it's part of their job, but I guess they forward the update forecast and drop it in, and then leave.

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Well, it's a record season in NZ, nearing 300" by July 1st.

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We are at 668 cm according to OpenSnow, compared to 263 cm on the Official Mt Hutt site, which is only a 250-300% difference.



This slightly irritates me because there are only really 20 ski areas to track in the Southern Hemisphere, and the model estimates are so opaque and pure confirmation-biased.
 
Sbooker said:
I'm eying a couple of days last minute at Mt Buller if they get a base happening and I see a period of clear weather. I've never skied at Buller and their day ticket price is comparatively reasonable at only $144 midweek if bought the day before. Hotham and Falls (Vail) are pricier and further from Melbourne.
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How do most people get to the Australian ski areas? Where do you fly into?
  • Canberra: Peisher, Thredbo, and Charlotte Pass?
  • Melbourne: Hotham, Buller?
I typed all the resorts into AI Bots, and it seemed like a lot of driving and wasted time; Sydney is almost a non-starter.

Given that my Epic Pass does not include Australia for 2025, I have no desire to pay Australian lift ticket prices, parking fees, other fees, and remote lodging costs for the beauty of skiing next to the cool trees. Following the US collusion/duopoly of Atlerra/Vail and its price-fixing scheme of $300/day walk-up tickets, Australia appears to be the second-worst value in the world for skiing.

I think my trip to Niseko covered Australian skiing culture; we went out on the night of Australia Day - scary! Do not allow any of you to drink from beer bottles! I think all the Aussies ended up outside the bars wanting to fight each other.

It makes St. Anton look safe at either:
  • 8 pm when people ski down in the dark from 2 pm apres from the Moosewirt/Krazy Kangaroo, or
  • Standing next to a British guy/girl trying to stand straight in ski boots at 12-1 am when they are likely to fall over and spill your beer.
 
ChrisC said:
How do most people get to the Australian ski areas? Where do you fly into?
  • Canberra: Peisher, Thredbo, and Charlotte Pass?
  • Melbourne: Hotham, Buller?
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Correct. Some take the cheap flights and car rental at Sydney.

ChrisC said:
think my trip to Niseko covered Australian skiing culture; we went out on the night of Australia Day - scary! Do not allow any of you to drink from beer bottles! I think all the Aussies ended up outside the bars wanting to fight each other.
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Niseko is now known as ‘Bali on snow’. It attracts all the Aussie bogans. That behaviour is not typical of Australian behaviour in general.
 
I had some e-mail correspondence with Joel yesterday. Earlier he had informed me:
For all snow report history, note that a yellow underline in the calendar shows that the value is estimated by use using multiple weather models, and data in cells that do NOT have a yellow underline is pulled directly from the resort.
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Upon closer examination of few areas on OpenSnow yesterday, I determined that there are 3 possible descriptions of any calendar month posted below the calendar.
1) Historical snowfall, base depth, and operating details are reported by the resort. OpenSnow does not verify this data.
2) Historical snowfall, base depth, and operating details are reported by the resort via SnoCountry. OpenSnow does not verify this data.
3) Historical snowfall and base depth numbers are calculated from resort reports (where available) and OpenSnow estimates, and may be adjusted to match official data.
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The Mt. Hutt page on OpenSnow has #1 displayed, reported by the resort. Joel replied,
Resorts change their page layouts all the time and we need to be better about updating our system when new layouts occur. We'll get Mt Hutt fixed.
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He's right about resorts fiddling with their snow report webpages. Every season I have revise some of the links on my snow reports page.

The via SnoCountry data can be problematic too. I pointed out that OpenSnow for Obergurgl totaled 11 inches of snow 11/1 - 3/31, all of those months allegedly reported by SnoCountry (description#2 below). Joel replied,
For Europe, Snocountry is terrible and we'll likely stop pulling from them (eg. Obergurgl's zeros came from Snocountry).
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St. Anton's 204 inches looked more reasonable but Dec-Mar were reported directly by the resort (description#1 below). So maybe the high profile places have better reporting? Nah! Les Arcs and Val d'Isere on OpenSnow are both using description #3, meaning historical snowfall is based on the weather models.

So I have some sympathy for what OpenSnow is doing. We really shouldn't use weather models to tally past snowfall, but OpenSnow is upfront about what they are doing and that it's not reliable. It's not as much of a distortion as using incomplete data from a resort and reporting zero for any date when the resort doesn't report. I believe OpenSnow uses incomplete data plus model data when the resort doesn't report.

For most resorts OpenSnow will generally show description #3 in April when those areas close sometime during the month. Presumably that means using the models after closing date. I checked that Mammoth and A-Basin show description #1 in April and May.
 
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