The Andes, which has always attracted skiers to the South American continent, is facing the historic lowest snowfall in more than a decade-long drought this year.

Light rain and snow leave many majestic mountains stretching between Ecuador and Argentina, exposing irregular patches of snow, or snow, to the brown land of the peaks.

Ricardo Villalba, principal researcher at the Argentine Institute of Snow, Glaciers and Environmental Science Studies, said that as rainfall decreases across the region and glaciers fall, communities that depend on mountains for water supply will face starvation.

“We are seeing a long process of rain, a big drought,” Villalba said.

“Now if you look at the amount of rainfall in the entire mountain range, they show that it was either snowfall or snowfall,” the scientist pointed out.

The southern hemisphere is now passing through winter as snowfall rises.

Ski resorts have reopened after a long closure during the outbreak, and are attracting domestic skiers to the Argentine-Chilean border. But sparse snow is causing more resorts to cover more popular slopes or create artificial snow.