Abstract
The 2026 Super El Niño is the strongest in a decade, and the June-July-August Sea Surface Temperature is the warmest on record. A series of large snowfall events hit the Central Chilean Andes in July 2026. We use a combination of shorter period-of-record automated daily snow depth (ds) and snow water equivalent (SWE) data with longer period-of-record manual monthly snowcourse (ds and SWE) data to assess how rare the July snowstorms were. The return period statistical analysis showed that the snow accumulation was relatively uncommon with an 8- to 40-year recurrence for the more northerly sites.