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Zao Now: Tuesday 31st January 2017

  • Jan 31, 2017
  • 2 min read

Independent snow and weather reporting from the Zao region of Yamagata


New snowfall at base 21cm
Snowfall at base this season 350cm

Posted on Tuesday 31st January 2017 This is an archived report. The latest Zao Now report can be found here.


A good 20cm of fresh snowfall in Zao this morning I'm happy to report; nice new layer.


Not much expected for today and possibly some sunshine tomorrow morning before the snow clouds return and there's a good chance of their being some wild stormy conditions into Thursday.


All lifts apart from the following appear to be operating today:

Paradise Number 3 pair

Karamatsu pair


All courses apart from Kotan are open.


Official snow depths (as published by the resort itself):

Summit - 100cm

Paradise - 170cm

Chuo - 170cm

Utopia - 135cm

Uwanodai - 110cm

Yokokura - 120cm



Zao Now 2016-2017 season

Data as of Tuesday 31st January 2017 Total snowfall at base 350cm Number of days snowfall observed at base 38 days Most snowfall observed in 1 day 39cm (on 16th January) November 2016 snowfall 11cm observed on 6 days December 2016 snowfall 98cm observed on 16 days January 2017 snowfall 241cm observed on 16 days




All snowfall data presented on this page is the snowfall measured and observed at base/town level by our reporter based in Zao Onsen. The 'new snowfall' number represents the amount of snow measured since the previous report. All opinions are those of the individual reporters. Information regarding ski area operations is manually checked every morning and is believed to be correct at the time of the report.


SnowJapan is an entirely independent operation. Our daily reports are not posted on behalf of ski areas or any other business or organisation. Since first going online in 1999, the integrity of this website has always been our top priority, and it is something we are not prepared to compromise. All content is carefully created and written by humans who share a passion for the subject and what SnowJapan stands for.



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