Atacama Desert snowfall forces researchers to shut down telescope – and suspect it’s another sign of climate change  

Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile, the largest astronomical project in the world [credit: NASA / Ames]

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Another one from the ‘warming causes cooling’ branch of climate theory. This article is keen to blame humans for more snow in the desert on the basis of what?
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Learn more about the snowfall that shut down ALMA in the Atacama desert, and how researchers worry this could be a sign of climate change, says Discover magazine.
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In late June and early July 2025, ALMA was caught in a highly unusual snowstorm, forcing it to enter an emergency “survival mode.” ALMA’s research team repositioned her dishes, tilting them to prevent snow buildup. This temporarily halted the telescopes’ observations.

The storm was localized, so the Southern Astrophysical Research (SOAR) Telescope and the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, both sited in the Atacama but just a few hundred miles southwest of ALMA, were not affected.
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A Wetter Future In The Atacama?
The Atacama’s incredibly dry climate may be subtly shifting. The region recorded no rainfall between October 1903 and January 1918, but snow fell in 2011, 2013, and 2021.
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These recent cases of climate change in the region may be further examples of how the anthropogenic climate crisis is altering the planet. [Talkshop comment – evidence-free assertion].

Soon, snow in the desert may become a more common challenge for ALMA to reckon with.
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Image: Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile, the largest astronomical project in the world [credit: NASA / Ames].