Australia’s 2026 ski season is coming to an unusually early end after record warmth, rain, and a lack of sustained snowfall devastated the country’s alpine snowpack.
Several major Australian ski resorts have already stopped spinning lifts, with some closing nearly a month earlier than originally planned.
Mount Hotham, Falls Creek, and Mount Buller all ended lift operations on September 6th. Mount Baw Baw and Selwyn Snow Resort had already called it quits, while Charlotte Pass also wrapped up its season in early September.
For Mount Hotham and Falls Creek, the difference is substantial. Both had originally scheduled their 2026 seasons to run into early October.
“Our teams have given it all that they have to keep us skiing and riding as long as we can, but Mother Nature had other plans for us this season,” Mount Hotham wrote when announcing its September 6 closing date.
It wasn’t simply a case of Australia not getting enough precipitation.
In fact, parts of the Australian Alps had an exceptionally wet winter. The problem was what was falling from the sky.
According to Australian climate scientists, unusually high temperatures meant a significant amount of that precipitation fell as rain instead of snow. Mount Hotham and Falls Creek experienced their wettest winters in more than 30 years while simultaneously recording their warmest average winter temperatures.
That combination was brutal for the snowpack.
Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology measurements at Spencers Creek in the Snowy Mountains recorded a snow depth of just 12.3 inches on September 3, the lowest reading ever recorded there for that point in the season.
The snowpack had peaked at only 37.2 inches on August 13, making it the third-lowest seasonal peak in records dating back to 1954.
For comparison, Australia’s alpine snowpack would historically be approaching its maximum around this time of year.
At Mount Hotham, the resort reported 63 inches of cumulative snowfall for the season, but by the time operations ended, the natural snow depth had effectively disappeared.
The mountain summed things up rather succinctly in its final cross-country conditions report:
“As disappointing as this winter was, we still got out there and made the most of it.”
Australia’s ski resorts are accustomed to highly variable winters, and extensive snowmaking has become critical for keeping terrain open during lean periods. This year, however, prolonged warmth and rain made even that difficult.
Mount Buller general manager Alan Arthur told The Herald Sun that unfavorable weather significantly hampered the resort’s snowmaking efforts despite substantial investment in the technology.
The long-term trend is difficult to ignore.
Snow measurements from Spencers Creek illustrate just how much conditions have changed. From the 1950s through the 1970s, average snow depth during the first week of September was slightly more than 71 inches. From 2020 through 2025, that average had fallen to roughly 47 inches.
The 2026 measurement: 12.2 inches.
Not every Australian ski area has shut down. Perisher has remained operational on a limited amount of terrain, while Thredbo has also continued offering skiing and snowboarding into September.
But across much of Australia’s ski country, winter is effectively over weeks ahead of schedule.
And after one of the warmest and least snowy winters ever recorded in the Australian Alps, resort operators will be hoping 2027 delivers a very different story.
