Unprecedented Snowfall Blankets Chile's Atacama Desert, Disrupting Observatories
In August 2026, back-to-back winter storms covered large parts of Chile's Atacama Desert with snow, forcing the ALMA telescope and other facilities to halt operations.
August 2026 brought two consecutive winter storms that deposited snow across an unusually wide swath of the Atacama Desert in northern Chile, from the high Andes to the Pacific shoreline. NASA-USGS Landsat 8 and 9 captured the scene on August 6 and 14, while MODIS on the Terra satellite recorded the later, broader snowfall on August 19. The snow and strong winds prompted the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) to enter a protective mode, and other coastal observatories also suspended work.
Scientists explained that a cutoff low, amplified by a massive trough spanning the Southern Hemisphere, supplied the moisture that fell as both snow and rain, with Taltal receiving nearly 40 mm of rain in three days. The deluge caused destructive mudflows and flash flooding, leaving thousands affected and hundreds of homes severely damaged. René Garreaud of the University of Chile noted that the event aligns with a strengthening El Niño, which is shifting the regional storm track and producing the rare wet conditions.
Why it matters
The storm's scale disrupted major scientific facilities and caused widespread flooding, highlighting climate extremes in a normally arid region.
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