Photo: Tignes this summer, by Barry Parker of Real Snowboarding
This year has seen two icons of summer shred die a death – Camp Of Champions in Whistler filed for bankruptcy back in June in order to provide refunds for its 2017 camps, and only last week Dachstein announced the permanent closure of its parks during the non-winter months. Both cited glacial retreat as the biggest contributing factor, with massively reduced snowpacks compared to twenty years ago needing proper maintenance, rather than having huge park jumps ripped into them each summer.
“Glacial strongholds all over Europe are showing obvious signs of massive losses in the snowpacks”
Not only that, but glacial strongholds all over Europe are showing obvious signs of huge losses in the snowpacks. Tignes is suffering massively due to a combination of a lower than average winter snowpack and an extra hot summer, but that’s also compounding years of retreat – locals are saying that this summer is the worst it’s looked for over twenty years. No wonder the resort is pushing their downhill bike infrastructure as well as development of an indoor snow dome and wave pool at the base of the 3500m glacier.
Climate change experts we’re not, but for safety we’ll err on the side of the 97% of the field’s authority figures who agree that it’s happening, and is doing so down to human behaviour. Mash your keyboards with all the hoax claims, natural cycle and big government rants you like, we’ve not had enough of experts, or our own eyes for that matter. Check out the photos of British filmer Johno Verity next to the Glacier du Bussons in Chamonix below, taken thirteen years apart.

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