The great snow melt of 2025 transforms the Snowy Mountains

As spring arrives, rivers in the Snowy Mountains surge with meltwater, revealing snow tunnels, waterfalls and hidden landscapes few ever see.

Transcript

00:00So, it's been a great snow season, but where does all that snow go in spring?

00:07Well, the great snowmelt of 2025 has begun.

00:13At the start of spring, there can still be a lot of snow around in the snowy mountains.

00:19For example, this year, the official depth as measured at Spencer's Creek on the 1st of September

00:27was almost 2.6 metres.

00:31So, just how much snowmelt do you get from, say, an Okubra full of snow?

00:39Is it a simple one-to-one conversion?

00:43No, far from it.

00:46According to my friends at the Bureau of Meteorology, it's more like one-tenth.

00:52On average, 2.6 metres of snow when it melts equates to about 260 millimetres of rain.

01:00But it's not an exact science, as factors like how densely the snow is packed

01:06can significantly affect these conversions.

01:12Regardless, it's still a lot of water that will run downstream into the mountain rivers.

01:19For example, much of the snowmelt here at Gothica is stored, diverted, and used for electricity production

01:29as part of the Snowy Hydro Scheme.

01:32How much actually makes it down the Snowy River all the way to the coast depends on several factors,

01:40including on just how much water is assigned as so-called environmental flows.

01:48But that's a story for another day.

01:50For now, let's enjoy the last few weeks of the 2025 ski season.

01:57What will you think about a future season?

01:59What will you think about a future season?

02:00What will you do in your future season?

02:01I'm hoping a few weeks of the year many years,

02:03when I'm trying to find a future season.

02:04But I'm hoping to find a future season.

02:05I will get to know a future season,

02:07that's a huge that I have been to the next season.

02:09I will be talking about a wintertime.

02:11You'll be paying for that.

02:13Let's get started.

02:14I have any new hopes of the new небony.

02:17You're looking for a future season.