I'm at the outset of a 10-day spell of travel, so probably won't be posting in the near future - but I wanted to comment on the news that a NWS "heat advisory" has been issued for the first time in Alaska. This has made headlines and stirred up interest quite widely.
First, the facts: there is indeed a heat advisory in effect for a large part of interior Alaska, from the Tanana region to the Fortymile Country (including Fairbanks-land), the Yukon-Tanana uplands, and the Yukon Flats.
Details:
This is indeed the first heat advisory issued in Alaska... but that's because the Alaska region NWS offices did not issue this product at all until this year. Special weather statements were used instead to draw attention to excessive warmth.
As for whether this event is particularly extreme - no, it's not, although it is an unusually hot spell for the region. Fairbanks is currently expected to see 85°F on three consecutive days, and that doesn't happen in most years - although it did in both 2023 and 2024 (in July). It's particularly unusual for June, having happened in only 6 Junes since 1930 (most recently in the very hot June of 2013).
Rick Thoman has an excellent write-up today on the same topic, including an explanation of the rationale for the NWS procedural change:
https://alaskaclimate.substack.com/p/alaskas-first-heat-advisory
June 12th we finally shut down our Toyo stoves. Weeks late. Now it's 80"s. Gotta's love Alaska and Fairbanks
ReplyDeleteWe fired up the woodstove last Friday when the high for the day was 47. But to the heat advisory story, the Juneau forecast office did not want to let Fairbanks have all the fun, and we have one in effect today for the upper portions of the Chilkat Valley. Here it only needs to be 80 for such an advisory, but unless the overcast breaks up soon that's going to be pretty hard to come by.
ReplyDeleteThanks Gary and Jim. It's a remarkable change - but not too surprising that the pattern would flip.
ReplyDeleteNice and toasty with smoke for the Solstice in Fairbanks. Bad times for the rural residents displaced by fires tho. Low humidities and a general lack of moisture has limited thunderstorms, but that is soon forecast to change as the High breaks down over central Alaska and moist S to SW flow begins.
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