A decidedly warm and soggy forecast for the Family Day long weekend means there probably won't be a lot of fun in the snow in store for North Shore ski hills.
And one climate scientist is warning that scenario could become more common with global warming trends.
Snow has been bit a of a no-show on the North Shore mountains lately as high temperatures and steady rain have chased the frosty flakes from the hills.
Workers on Mt. Seymour have been digging ditches to drain the tobogganing area as the Pineapple Express continues its deluge, according to Simon Whitehead, marketing manager for the resort.
"We have a lot of rain coming down still so we'll be making an assessment each day," he said, adding that skiers and snowboarders should check the website before trekking up the mountainside.
At press time, only Seymour's learning area and tobogganing run were open.
"We've still got a lot of rain to come," Whitehead noted.Conditions are just as sopping on Cypress, where cross-country trails, snowshoe paths, the tube park and ski trails are closed until the weather gets a bit colder and drier.
Thanks to their snowmaking efforts during a cold snap at the end of 2014, Cypress has the equivalent of 162 football fields with one foot of snow. However, a paltry snowfall over the past week has prevented Cypress from opening up more of the mountain. The pond is open for skating on Grouse Mountain but the downhill runs are closed until more snow falls. One of the skiers who is staying away from the hills over the Family Day long weekend is University of British Columbia climatology associate professor Simon Donner. The wet weather is likely part of a larger pattern caused by global warming, according to Donner. "The general warming trend. .. is making things like this a little more common and a little more severe," he said.
Donner has spoken and written at length on the subject of global climate change caused by human activity.
"You can never look at some particular weather event and say 'A-ha! It's due to global warming,'" he said, discussing Friday's rainstorm. "But the news that I've seen in the past few days and the weather I've seen in the past few days, this is exactly what people have been predicting."
As those bad years on the slopes become the rule rather than the exception, Donner said he wonders how resorts at lower elevations will survive when daytime rain negates overnight snowmaking efforts.
"The top of Whistler's still going to be getting snow in the winter 50 or 100 years from now. The places you worry about are the places more on the margins," he said. "The thing I'd worry about for places like Cypress and Seymour, is even though you're going to have a lot of nights that are cold enough to make some snow, those warm temperatures during the day make the conditions terrible.. .. Who wants to go skiing when it's 7 C and raining outside?"
For skiers asking that same question, Mt. Seymour is hoping an island retreat might be the answer they're looking for. Mt. Washington Alpine Resort on
Vancouver Island is offering complimentary skiing and snowboarding for Mt. Seymour season pass holders while the North Shore mountain waits for snow.
