In the early hours of the morning of Friday 9 January a white blanket, only apparently snow, covered the streets, monuments and buildings of Bolzano and its surroundings offering the citizens of South Tyrol breathtaking views.
If for the capital it was at most a “dusting of snow”, the situation is different in other areas of Alto Adige, such as in Val di Roia at Passo Resia: here up to fifteen centimeters of accumulation were recorded.
What really happened
It wasn’t just snowflakes. Along with those, underlined the meteorologist Dieter Peterlin, there was also the “Graupel” (in Italian “round snow” or “gragnola”): these are small balls of ice, white and opaque, which are formed when snow crystals are covered with frost in a warmer and more humid atmospheric layer.
“It is a typical phenomenon during the passage of a cold front which is bringing short but widespread showers across the entire territory” concluded the expert.
