SnowMapper: operational snow forecasts for Central Asia
Duration: 2021-2026
Overview
The Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation supports multiple projects in semi-arid Central Asia that aim to enhance the effective management of shared water resources. Within this framework, the SAPPHIRE Central Asia and CROMO-ADAPT projects have collaborated to implement SnowMapper CA, a web-based system for operational snow cover analysis spanning the Tien Shan, Gissar-Alay, Pamir, and Hindukush mountain ranges.
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Process
SnowMapper CA is a web-based tool developed to improve operational snow monitoring in Central Asia’s mountainous regions. Using ECMWF ERA5T and IFS 10-day forecasts with the TopoPyScale downscaling pipeline, it produces snow height, snow water equivalent and snowmelt forecasts at 500-meter resolution. A 24-year climatology allows users to benchmark current snow conditions against historical patterns, supporting real-time decision-making for water management. The tool performs strongly compared to in-situ observations, underscoring its value for hydrological forecasting.
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Results
To support the improvement of forecast models, we operate a network of high-altitude monitoring stations and conduct targeted field campaigns to generate new datasets for model evaluation and refinement. This includes glacier monitoring, snow sampling, and drone-based surveys of peak snow accumaltion throughout the Tian Shan, providing critical, high-resolution observations in regions where data are otherwise scarce.
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