The Australian snow season has been virtually wiped out by rain and warm weather.

As things stand at the start of the last working week of winter, all of Australia's mainland ski resorts have lost significant snow after weeks of warmth and unfavourable weather culminated in a weekend of heavy rain, storms, and extremely strong winds.

• A gust of 150 km/h was recorded at the Victorian ski resort of Mt Buller on Sunday evening.
• Australia’s highest weather station at the top of Thredbo recorded a gust of 119 km/h.

The combination of wind, rain and warm temperatures create what locals call "hair dryer conditions" in the mountains, and those conditions have led to significant areas of terrain closing at all resorts.

Selwyn Snow Resort in NSW has closed entirely as of Monday morning (although it may re-open if fresh snowfalls occur).

The Victorian resorts of Mt Buller Hotham, Falls Creek and Mt Baw Baw, now only have runs open where a deep base was created earlier this season with snowmaking.

Perisher, Thredbo and Charlotte Pass in NSW (Australia’s three highest resorts) all have severely diminished terrain options, although as the image below shows, staff are doing what they can.

Image: When push comes to shovel, they'll do what it takes to keep the lifts running. Source: Sean Sunley via ski.com.au.

Monday morning at Smiggin Holes (part of the Perisher ski resort) revealed lift operations staff shovelling whatever snow they could find to keep the chairlift open. The prospect of a late-August scene like that was unthinkable at the start of this month.

In early August, the snowpack was around a metre in depth at higher elevations of NSW and Victoria. At the stage, the 2024 season was shaping up to be quite promising. A repeat of the disappointing 2023 season seemed unlikely.

But that is exactly what has happened, as the depth chart below shows.

Image: Bear in mind that the snow depth of 101 cm at Spencers Creek (the dark blue line) is more likely around half that much since last week’s reading. Source: Snowy Hydro.

• The 2023 season saw the earliest peak depth on record in NSW (on July 30), followed by an exceptionally mild, largely snowless August.
• As stated, 2024 has followed the 2023 script to the letter, although if anything it has been worse because of at least two bursts of heavy rain. So in other words, rinse and repeat.
• The snowpack in Victoria is even worse. Even before this weekend’s rain, Hotham’s base of 36 cm was its lowest on record for August. This Monday, it is down to 25 cm, with just three of the resort’s 15 lifts spinning.

Image: Hotham village is situated almost atop the mountain, so you don't expect to see grass outside your window in August. Source: Dr Sally on Twitter.

So what now for the Aussie snow season?

Traditionally, the Australian snow season closes on the first week of October at our two highest resorts, Perisher and Thredbo. Will it make it?

Not unless there's fresh snow and plenty of it, no. At least two bursts of snow are in the forecast for the week ahead, but it's likely that rain will precede the snowfalls both times, negating the benefit of the snowy top-up and perhaps making things worse overall.

The system due around Wednesday will be particularly frustrating for snow sports enthusiasts as it looks set to deliver bitterly cold temps and heavy snowfalls to Tasmania with the majority of the action staying just south of the mainland. We'll keep you posted.