Long-term snow and weather observations at Weissfluhjoch and its relation to other high-altitude observatories in the Alps

Marty, Christoph and Meister, Roland

Theoretical and Applied Climatology

2012

0177798X

573--583

110

Springer Science & Business Media

Issue Title: 125 Years of High-Mountain Research at Sonnblick Observatory (Austrian Alps) Snow and weather observations at Weissfluhjoch were initiated in 1936, when a research team set a snow stake and started digging snow pits on a plateau located at 2,540 m asl above Davos, Switzerland. This was the beginning of what is now the longest series of daily snow depth, new snow height and bi-monthly snow water equivalent measurements from a high-altitude research station. Our investigations reveal that the snow depth at Weissfluhjoch with regard to the evolution and inter-annual variability represents a good proxy for the entire Swiss Alps. In order to set the snow and weather observations from Weissfluhjoch in a broader context, this paper also shows some comparisons with measurements from five other high-altitude observatories in the European Alps. The results show a surprisingly uniform warming of 0.8°C during the last three decades at the six investigated mountain stations. The long-term snow measurements reveal no change in mid-winter, but decreasing trends (especially since the 1980s) for the solid precipitation ratio, snow fall, snow water equivalent and snow depth during the melt season due to a strong temperature increase of 2.5°C in the spring and summer months of the last three decades.[PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]

4

eng

Wien

Alps ; Climate Change ; Snow ; Meteorology ; Weather ; Global Warming