[dashdot]

There are a lot of Aspens in Switzerland. But seriously, I hope there will be consequences. Everyone in my bubble disapproves this strongly. Yes, there is not much snow. Yes, it is crippling snow tourism. But I can't imagine there are a lot of Swiss people who think that flying in snow is justified in any way.

[tduberne]

I do not live in Switzerland anymore, so I cannot do a survey, but I can tell you helicopters are used an absurd amount in Switzerland, and everyone seems fine with it. For instance I personally saw, with my own eyes, helicopters used to:

- install an AC unit on the roof of a university building

- move building material from one side of campus to the other side

- extract dead trees from a small forest with an extensive network of roads and paths

- plant trees in the middle of campus. Which lead to this fantastic exchange with my then 2 yo: "look papa, a flying tree!" "What do you mean?" "There!" "Oh, you are right. A flying tree. Do you want a banana?"

My pet theory is that given the high wages in Switzerland, it quickly becomes cheaper to rent a chopper for two hours then to get a crane built, operated and unbuilt.

[sschueller]

It's not cheap but in many cases it's the only way, logging on steep hills or supplies for very remote regions etc.. Only 50% of what Air Zermatt does is rescue.

[faebi]

I'm from Zürich, and they literally transported half the forest away using helicopters. Took them weeks. I have no idea how that made sense.

[Kon-Peki]

> But I can't imagine there are a lot of Swiss people who think that flying in snow is justified in any way.

I just got back from skiing in Vail Colorado. People in Europe may object to flying snow to the mountain, but they certainly do not object to flying themselves to the snow.

In the shared gondola and lift rides, people speaking English within their groups were the minority. I am not complaining, it was a wonderful time and I really enjoyed meeting and talking to people from all over the place!

FYI - the storm systems that are flooding California are producing an epic winter for the ski resorts in the western USA. It's been at least 20 years since I've seen anything this nice! It's really not a surprise that people are coming from around the world to experience it.

[mrep]

Yeah it's nuts here in western USA. We've gotten over 200 inches of snow here in Park City Utah and I saw like 10 dump trucks full of snow hauling it away just walking to the grocery store yesterday.