Barrow will have Warmest October of Record

Barrow looking north, Sunday 1030am. Courtesy of UAF Sea Ice Group

The mean temperature for the first 27 days of October at Barrow has been 28.0F. The warmest October was 2006 with an average temperature of 25.5F. This means Barrow would have to have an average temperature of 8.6F the last four days of the month NOT to set a new record for the entire month. Since winds remain west to northwest, there is no chance at all of that happening and it is a certainty that Barrow will have the warmest October of record. 

October Temperature Departures

Dawn Saturday at Lake Minchumina, courtesy of the FAA

For the first 26 days of October, here are the average temperature departures from normal (1981-2010 normals) for some NWS locations:

Juneau: -2.9F
Anchorage: -1.2F
Fairbanks: -2.1F
McGrath: +1.1F
Bethel: +1.2F
Nome: +2.1F
Kotzebue: +3.7F
Barrow: +9.1F

Find the outlier.

Freeze-Up Nearly Complete

Courtesy of Pro Music

Here's a view from Friday afternoon from the Pro Music webcam looking south across the Chena River in downtown Fairbanks. As you can see, freeze-up is nearly complete.

Wimpy No More

If Tuesday morning's inversion was lackluster by Interior Alaska standards, Wednesday morning's sounding looks a lot more like what we expect in winter. Temperatures above the valley floor have been rising since early Tuesday evening, and overnight the winds picked up. Nothing extreme, but enough to "mix it up". With clear skies under the big high aloft, the valley floor continues to cool, and the resulting inversion becomes self-reinforcing, isolating the valley surface from winds generated by the moderate pressure gradient. The result of all this are temperatures in the teens below in the usual cool areas on the valley floor (-15F at Goldstream Creek at 8am) to the teens above well up in the hills (+16F at Keystone Ridge at 8am). Fairbanks Airport has been down to 9 below thus far, the lowest of the season to date.

A Little Inversion

The surface based temperature inversion was fairly underwhelming at 3am Tuesday, as shown in the plot on the left: only about 9ºC in 1000 meters. After balloon launch time surface temperatures cooled some more before fairly widespread fog developed. Fairbanks Airport got to 6 below, Woodsmoke PWS 14 below and Goldstream Creek 16 below. Here on Keystone Ridge as of 9 am it's been down to 1 above; as I write this I'm looking at lovely dawn colors in the eastern sky, with the tops of the fog in the valley well below.

First Sub-Zero in Fairbanks

Arctic Village Monday afternoon. Courtesy of the FAA

Fairbanks Airport reported a low of 5 below Monday morning, the first sub-zero temperature of the season, and about a week earlier than average. For comparison, the record low for Oct 22nd is 16 below set in 1956.

Chicken reported 21 below and Arctic Village 18 below for lows Monday morning. Just like winter. Only warmer…

Sub-Zero Around Fairbanks

Courtesy of UAF's Alaska Climate Research Center

Friday evening a few of the normally cold spots nicked just below zero, but this sunny Sunday morning subzero temperatures are more widespread. Through 10am lows include:

Woodsmoke PWS -7F  (near North Pole)
Chena Hot Springs: -6F
Goldstream Creek: -5F
Eielson AFB: -5F
Fort Wainwright: +2F
Fairbanks Airport: +3
UAF West Ridge: +4F

Keystone Ridge: +10F

Putting Down the Winter Snowpack

The Fairbanks area received three to five inches of snow over the course of several days early this week, with the result that everywhere in the area now has a solid snow cover. In spite of the mild weather early in the month, this is right on schedule: the long term median date for establishment of the permanent winter snow cover is October 18th. It is possible, but high unlikely, that the current snow cover could be reduced to a trace. Since 1929, twice has there been two inches of snow on the ground (the current snow depth at the Airport) on October 20th, only to have it melt back to a trace later in the month. Snow cover is defined here to be a snow depth on one inch or more at the standard time of day for snow depth reporting (traces do not count) and each day thereafter also has one inch or more on the ground through March 31st.

A couple of things stand out on the chart. First, in the past twenty years there has been much less variability in when the winter snow pack was established compared to previous decades (only one year more than 10 days from the median). Also note that it's a lot more common to have very late establishment of snow pack than very early. Only two autumns has the snow pack been established more than 15 days early (1956 and 1992), but seven times has the snow cover been more than 15 days late (though none since 1982). This includes the remarkable autumn of 1934, when the thin snow cover of November was obliterated by the super Chinook of December 3-8, 1934 and then there was no measurable precipitation until after the day after Christmas, resulting in the only "brown Christmas" in Fairbanks weather history.

Fairbanks Temperature Update

After a mild start, October temperatures having been running below normal mid-month. Here's the 2012 plot of daily standardized temperature anomalies for Fairbanks through Thursday, October 18th.

Freeze-Up Underway

Here's a webcam photo taken Saturday morning from Pro Music looking south across the Chena River in downtown Fairbanks. As you can see, there is some ice showing up now. With sub-freezing weather now in place, the rivers will freeze quickly over the next few days.

More on October and Winter Temperatures in Fairbanks

Continuing on the thread that Richard of Georgia asked of "Do October temperatures have predictive value value for the upcoming winter?"

A few days I presented a scatter plot of mean October temperatures vs. mean December through February temperatures, and the results were not encouraging.

Here I abstract away from the actual mean temperatures and give you the rank correlations for the 82 winters since 1930-31 (1 being the coldest and 82 being the warmest).  So, each point represents a pairing of the rank in the 82 winters of October mean temperature and the corresponding rank of the following mid-winter. As you can see, the correlation is pretty weak. However, just looking at the ten coldest Octobers (far left on the x-axis), what I see is that the following mid-winter has not been among warmest, while with the warmest Octobers (far right on the x-axis), there are no really cold mid-winters. So, what I get out of this analysis is that if there is an unusually cold or warm (top ten) October, then past performance suggests that the following mid-winter will not be among the extremes of the opposite sign, i.e. a very cold October is most unlikely to be followed by very warm mid-winter, (but could easily be above normal) and vice versa. Outside of the extremes, I find no useful signal at all.

I did look at the 1946-1976 negative PDO phase and the 1976-2007 positive PDO phase. During the negative PDO, the ranked correlation was slightly higher (0.19) than the full 82 years, while during the positive PDO phase the ranked correlation was an abysmal 0.08.

First Sub-Zero Temperatures of the Season

It helps to have snow on the ground to get temperatures down below zero, but you don't need it. A number of places got that cold this morning, and most of those places have no snow cover at all. These are the first subzero temperatures of the season in Alaska. Here's an FAA webcam photo from the Eagle Airport Thursday afternoon, where the low temperature was 1 below.

Courtesy of the FAA

Other lows Thursday morning included:

Chicken: -5F (snow early last week all melted)
Chalkyitsik RAWS: -4F (east of Fort Yukon)
Tok CWOP: 0F
Kandik River Coop: +5F

Record Warm Start to October at Barrow

For the first time in nearly a century of instrumented weather observations at Barrow, the average temperature for the first ten days of October was above freezing. The average temperature of 32.1F is 0.6 degrees warmer than the previous record of 31.5F in 1977. During the first ten days of the month Barrow set two record highs (41F on the 5th and 38F on the 6th) and was within a degree of the record high on the 7th with a high  of 37F. The 1981-2010 normal temperature for this period is 23.5F.

Okay, whoop-dee-do. Half a degree. Breaking a record set 35 years ago. However, when taken in context, the significance becomes unequivocal. Here is a plot of the mean temperature for the first ten days of October since 1920 (blue) and the 10-year running mean (black). Notice that there was a bunch of warm periods in the 1930s and 40s, but since 2002 there have been ZERO cold starts to October. It wasn't like this in the 30s. The lack of near shore sea ice does not guarantee there will be record warm temperatures. But it does mean that even over as short of a period as ten days, there are many more ways to be warm (compared to long term societal and environmental expectations) than otherwise.

October and the Upcoming Winter

Richard from Georgia asked about the correlation of temperatures in October to the following winter. As a first crack at answering this, to the left is a plot of the October mean temperature vs. the mean temperature the following mid-winter, December through February. I've divided up the scatter plot in four quadrants based on the mean temperatures for the 81 years of data used here. As you can see, there is not much correlation (R=0.13). Some cold Octobers are followed by very mild winters, and vice versa. For example, Oct 2000 had an average temperature of 22.3F, about 3 degrees below the long term average, but was followed by the warmest mid-winter in the past 82 years. In contrast, last October was very mild (mean temperature 28.9F), but was followed by a  mid-winter with an average temperature of -11.0F, the coldest in years. 

However, this is not the whole story. We know that the warm phase of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (1976-2007) correlated with much warmer winters in Interior Alaska than previous decades, but October (and the autumn in general) did not warm very much at all during the same time period.  I'll take at look at this complication in another post.

No Snow in Golden Heart City

Fairbanks is still waiting for the first measurable snow of the autumn, and it's getting quite late in the season to still be waiting for that important event. At the right is a histogram of dates of first measurable (0.1" or more) of the autumn since 1930. Only in 13 of the past 82 years has the first measurable snow been October 10th or later. Cooler weather looks to be in place now, but after Monday's soaker there is no precipitation at all in the forecast for the next several days. In recent years the latest dates for first measurable snow are last year, October 13th, and 1979, October19th.

Rain and Snow

Central, Alaska. Courtesy of the FAA

Updated:
Fairbanks was soaked Sunday night and Monday with about three quarters of an inch of rain. Although I can't be sure because of mixed rain rain and snow events, it looks like the 0.76 inches of rain from late Sunday to Monday afternoon is the third greatest rain event of record in Fairbanks for the month of October. The snow level remained pretty high through the event. Here at Keystone Ridge there was some wet snow at times but it only briefly accumulated before melting. Above 2000 feet MSL there was more: coming home from work Monday afternoon I observed about 3 inches of wet snow at 2400 feet on Murphy Dome Road. The Eagle Summit SNOTEL, at 3600 feet elevation, evidently had about five inches of snow.

Record Warmth at Barrow

Courtesy of UAF Sea Ice Group

The temperature at Barrow on Friday reached 41F at Barrow, breaking the previous record of 39F set in 1925, and just two degrees from the record high for the month of October. At the left is the Sea Ice cam photo from 930am Saturday. Notice anything odd in this picture? If you said "no snow on the ground", you'd be right. Barrow gone this late in the autumn without any snow on the ground just five times in the past 95 years. Four of those years have been since 1998.

Brooks Range Autumn

Here's a webcam shot from Friday morning at Ivotuk, a research site southwest in the Brooks Range of Umiat at about 2000 feet elevation. Temperatures overnight remained a bit above freezing, but cooler air will return over the weekend and this snow cover is likely to be there until late May or early June.

Warm October Day

Temperatures rose into the 50s and lower 60s in southern Interior Alaska on Thursday. The high at Fairbanks Airport of 61F was just a degree shy of the October 4th record of 62F set in 1923. Other highs included 61F at Fort Greely, 59F at Fort Wainwright and Nenana, 58F at UAF West Ridge and 54F at Keystone Ridge. The unseasonably warm weather is the result of deep southerly flow aloft. This geostationary image from 630pm ADT Thursday tells the story:

The deep low in the central Bering Sea is the extra-tropical rebirth of ex-Typhoon Jelawat. The occlusion is stretched northeast to southwest across mainland Alaska, and south of Kodiak you can see the clouds arcing around a big high aloft centered over the southeast Gulf of Alaska. While temperatures will cool off some, for the most part it looks to remain warmer than normal through the weekend.

Heavy Snow in the FortyMile County

An innocuous looking cloud mass associated with weak closed low aloft brought heavy snow to a small area in far eastern Interior Sunday into early Monday. The NOAA-19 polar orbiter image from  543am ADT Monday shows a hint of the closed low center just southeast of Chicken.

The cooperative observer at Chicken reported 8.0 inches of snow (0.60 inches liquid) Monday morning. Chicken is at about 1800' MSL, and no doubt higher elevations along the Taylor Highway received more. Eagle reported exactly the same amount of liquid as Chicken, but because Eagle is almost 1000' lower elevation, the precipitation fell as rain or mixed rain and snow, with no accumulation in Eagle proper. There was just a dusting at Tok and Northway.

September Summary For Fairbanks

What I did last night...

PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE FAIRBANKS AK
611 AM AKDT MON OCT 1 2012

...MONTHLY WEATHER SUMMARY FOR FAIRBANKS ALASKA...

SEPTEMBER WEATHER IN FAIRBANKS WAS LARGELY UNEVENTFUL...WITH
ALTERNATING PERIODS OF WARM AND COOL WEATHER AND WELL BELOW NORMAL
RAINFALL. THE STORM AT MID MONTH THAT BROUGHT DAMAGING WINDS TO
PORTIONS OF THE UPPER TANANA VALLEY WAS NOT NEARLY SO STRONG IN
THE FAIRBANKS AREA.

OVERALL...THE AVERAGE HIGH TEMPERATURE AT THE FAIRBANKS AIRPORT WAS
55 DEGREES AND THE AVERAGE LOW 36 DEGREES. THE AVERAGE TEMPERATURE 
FOR SEPTEMBER OF 45.5 DEGREES MADE THIS THE COOLEST SEPTEMBER
SINCE 2004...BUT WAS STILL 0.6 DEGREES WARMER THAN NORMAL. THE
HIGHEST TEMPERATURE LAST MONTH WAS 67 DEGREES ON THE 22ND AND THE
LOW OF 26 DEGREES OCCURRED ON THE 13TH AND 30TH. AT THE AIRPORT 
THE FIRST FREEZE OF THE AUTUMN OCCURRED ON THE 8TH...WHICH IS
ALMOST EXACTLY THE LONG TERM AVERAGE DATE OF THE FIRST FREEZING
TEMPERATURE.

FOR THE THIRD MONTH IN A ROW...PRECIPITATION WAS WELL BELOW
NORMAL. JUST 0.55 INCHES OF RAIN FELL AT THE AIRPORT...WHICH IS
ONLY HALF OF NORMAL. ABOUT HALF OF THAT SCANT TOTAL FELL ON THE
20TH AND 21ST. FOR JULY THROUGH SEPTEMBER THE TOTAL RAINFALL WAS
72 PERCENT OF NORMAL. THIS PERSISTENT DRY WEATHER ALLOWED THE DRY
CREEK FIRE...ON THE FLATS WEST OF EIELSON AFB...TO CONTINUE TO
BURN...ESPECIALLY WHEN FANNED BY GUSTY WINDS. AN UNUSUAL LATE
SEASON THUNDERSTORM RUMBLED ACROSS THE EAST SIDE OF FAIRBANKS
AND IN THE NORTH POLE AREA DURING THE AFTERNOON OF THE 9TH...WHEN
SOME SPOTS HAD THE GROUND WHITENED IN HAIL. 

THE ONLY SNOW OF THE MONTH IN TOWN FELL ON MORNING OF THE 30TH.
JUST A TRACE FELL AT THE AIRPORT BUT SOME NEIGHBORHOODS RECEIVED
A SHORT LIVED DUSTING. EVEN IN THE HILLS THERE WAS NO SIGNIFICANT
ACCUMULATION. 

LOOKING AHEAD TO OCTOBER,,,THE PERMANENT WINTER SNOW PACK IS
ALMOST ALWAYS ESTABLISHED SOMETIME IN OCTOBER. AS A RESULT THE
AVERAGE DAILY TEMPERATURE FALLS 25 DEGREES DURING THE MONTH...FROM
AN AVERAGE OF 36 DEGREES ON THE FIRST TO 11 ABOVE ON HALLOWEEN.
OVER THE PAST 107 YEARS...OCTOBER TEMPERATURES HAVE RANGED FROM 72
DEGREES IN 2003 TO 28 BELOW IN 1935. TOTAL PRECIPITATION AVERAGES
0.83 INCHES. MUCH OF THIS TYPICALLY FALLS AS SNOW...AND SIGNIFICANT
RAINFALL IS RARE AFTER MID-MONTH. NORMAL SNOWFALL IS ABOUT 11
INCHES. THE LAST TIME FAIRBANKS DID NOT HAVE A WHITE HALLOWEEN WAS
IN 1962. RAPIDLY DECREASING POSSIBLE SUNSHINE CONTRIBUTES TO THE
TRANSITION TO WINTER...FALLING FROM 11 HOURS AND 14 MINUTES ON THE
1ST TO 7 HOURS AND 53 MINUTES ON THE 31ST.

THE OUTLOOK FOR FAIRBANKS FOR OCTOBER FROM THE CLIMATE PREDICTION
CENTER CALLS FOR INCREASED CHANCES OF SIGNIFICANTLY ABOVE NORMAL
TEMPERATURES AND PRECIPITATION.

Mixed Autumn Signals

In the middle of the night...

PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE FAIRBANKS AK
146 AM AKDT SUN SEP 30 2012

...COOL DAYS RIGHT ON SCHEDULE IN FAIRBANKS BUT STILL NO SNOW...

THE HIGH TEMPERATURE ON SATURDAY AT THE FAIRBANKS INTERNATIONAL
AIRPORT WAS 38 DEGREES...MAKING THIS THE FIRST DAY THIS AUTUMN
WITH A HIGH TEMPERATURE LOWER THAN 40 DEGREES. THIS IS RIGHT ON
SCHEDULE...AS OVER THE PAST 80 YEARS THE AVERAGE DATE IN THE
AUTUMN FOR THE FIRST DAY WITH A HIGH TEMPERATURE BELOW 40 DEGREES
IS SEPTEMBER 28TH.

WHILE THERE HAVE BEEN SNOW FLURRIES IN THE HILLS AROUND 
TOWN...FAIRBANKS IS STILL WAITING FOR THE FIRST SNOW OF THE
SEASON...WHICH IS NOW DECIDEDLY LATE. THE AVERAGE DATE FOR THE
FIRST AUTUMN SNOW IN FAIRBANKS IS SEPTEMBER 21ST.

$$
RT SEP 12

Fire Season Wrap-up

In the little fire season that would not die, the Industrial Park Fire near Delta Junction was up to just under 6000 acres as of Friday morning, while the Dry Creek Fire west of Eielson AFB was last measured measured at 47,154 acres. This brings the total acreage burned in Alaska this year to 266,409 acres, almost exactly 2011's total. The total acreage burned has increased by 28% since the end of July, which seems to me to be unusually high. The culprit has been the warm, dry and at times windy weather in the Tanana valley that has prevailed since August.

Wickersham Dome Weather Station

Big news for Fairbanks area weather buffs: a new automated weather on Wickersham Dome came online yesterday.  It is located near the White Mountains National Recreation area Wickersham Dome Trailhead at Mile 28 Elliott Highway. This is about 20 miles northwest of Fox. The station is at an elevation of 2230' MSL. This is a bit below treeline, and the anemometer is about level with the tops of the tallest trees around it. This is a great place for a weather station and should provide useful temperature and wind information in the winter, plus rainfall data in the warm season. This area gets a lot of convection, and this station fills a big hole in the rain gauge network north of Fairbanks. You can find the data from the Wickersham Dome weather station here and here.

Created by RT with Google Maps

To the right is a map I ginned up showing the locations of real-time reporting weather stations at higher elevations (vaguely) north and west of Fairbanks. I have NOT included any of the CWOP or Weather Underground personal weather stations, as the data availability and quality are highly variable. At the link for this map you can find additional information on the specific sites as well as the weather stations at elevation east of Fairbanks. 

Summer is Gone

Summer is gone, and we know this how? Well, in addition to looking outside and seeing the bare trees, solar heating is now no longer the dominant driver of temperatures in Interior Alaska. Rather, surface cooling (longwave radiation) and horizontal movement of air masses with different thermal characteristics (advection) are starting to overwhelm daytime heating from the sun.

The plot at the right shows hourly temperatures Sunday evening into Tuesday at Keystone Ridge and Goldstream Creek. Focus on Monday evening. With clear skies and no wind, temperatures on the valley floor dropped like a rock after sunset, with the low temperature for the (calendar) day occurring near midnight. Meanwhile, 325 meters up the hill, after briefly  falling a few degrees toward sunset, temperatures not only slowly rose, but the high temperature for the (calendar) day occurred about the same time the valley was reaching the low temperature, not long before midnight. This was possible because, in spite of plenty of sunshine during the day Monday, the high temperature on Keystone Ridge during the afternoon Monday was just seven degrees higher than the morning low temperature. Maximum solar elevation Monday was 24º above the horizon, which is about the same as Chicago on winter solstice.

Warm Equinox

The autumnal equinox occurred at 649am ADT Saturday, but you would not have known it from the  temperatures in the Interior. At Fairbanks Airport, the high of 67F and the low 47F would have been exactly normal for August 14th. Thick cirrostratus covered the Fairbanks area all day, which kept high temperatures down a bit. There were no records set as the 22nd was the last day of the great September 1995 chinook.

Other high temperatures included:

Eielson AFB: 69F
UAF West Ridge: 67F
Aurora: 67F
Fairbanks Mid-town: 67F
Gilmore Creek CRN: 66F
Goldstream Creek: 65F
Keystone Ridge: 61F

Temperatures did nick 70F in the eastern Interior, including 71F at Chicken and 73F at Eagle.

Nenana River Flooding

Hydrograph courtesy of the Alaska-Pacific RFC

The Nenana River at Healy reached the highest stage of record Saturday, causing problems in the Denali National Park east end area.The hydrograph on the left shows a peak stage of 14.9 feet, well above the previous record of 14.4 feet set September 15, 1990. The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner is reporting threats to the Parks Highway north of the Denali National Park entrance as the river erodes the banks. In spots the river is threatening the road, which in a stretch between the Glitter Gulch and Healy is perched on a narrow ledge between the river and the scree slopes. The high stage on the river is the result of copious rains in the headwaters: A SNOTEL (Monahan Flats), which is in the Sustina drainage but only a few miles from the upper Nenana watershed, measured 4.8 inches of rain September 13-21. The recent high freezing levels were likely a secondary factor.

Tina Graham photo from the Fairbanks-Daily News-Miner

Another Chinook

South winds aloft pushed very warm warm air into the central Interior Alaska Friday night and Saturday morning, resulting in dawn temperatures more typical of July than the autumnal equinox. In the Fairbanks area at 8am ADT, temperatures were mostly in the 50s and lower 60s. Here is the 500 mb analysis for 4am ADT Saturday. Note the strong ridge extending from western Montana northward to west of the Mackenzie River, with deep southerly flow over nearly all of mainland Alaska.

Courtesy of Environment Canada

The warming on the Fairbanks sounding between Friday afternoon and Saturday morning was quite dramatic (lowest 1500 meters plotted below). In most places the overnight low temperatures occurred Friday evening and then rose steadily after midnight. Here on Keystone Ridge the high temperature Friday of 55F occurred shortly before midnight. At the Goldstream Creek PWS, the temperature fell to 36F by 1030pm but jumped from 43F to 57F between 5am and 6am as the wind broke through the inversion.

The cirrus is fairly thick this morning but will likely thin in the afternoon, and it is possible, albeit unlikely that the record high for September 22nd of 73F set in 1995 would be broken.

Unseasonable Warmth in the Eastern Interior

Fairbanks-land had a seasonably cool day Thursday with morning fog and a little light rain...pretty typical stuff for around the autumnal equinox. The far eastern Interior though remained in moderate southerly flow aloft around the backside of a strong high aloft over central british columbia..which allowed for some sunshine and unseasonably warm temperatures.

The high of 70 at Northway broke the record for September 20th of 67F set in 1951 (weather observations in Northway date back to 1942). The Climate Reference Network station east of Northway, at the old Seaton Roadhouse site near Alaska Highway Mile 1234 had a high of 75F, while the DOT RWIS at the Alaska-Yukon border had a high of 73F. Tok topped out at 71F, a few degrees shy of the record for the date. Records are a bit higher the next few days, so I would not expect any more records, but it will remain quite mild...and will spread west to Fairbanks for Saturday at least.

Brooks Range Snow

Photo courtesy of the FAA

The clouds broke Thursday afternoon at Chandalar DOT camp on the Dalton Highway (3000' MSL), reveling a pretty snow covered  landscape. Not much snow yet at lower elevations. Even Anaktuvuk Pass still with bare ground.

Arctic Sea Ice Minimum

Courtesy of NSIDC

The National Snow and Ice Data Center has called the 2012 summer Arctic Sea ice minimum as occurring this past Sunday, September 16, with a coverage of 3.41 million square kilometers. This is 18% lower than the 2007 minimum and barely half of the 1979-2000 average seasonal minimum. Note that NSIDC defines ice cover as a 15% coverage or more. It is going to be an interesting autumn, as this is a whole lot of open water way far north.

Wind Recap—Updated

Photo by Rod Combellick via Fairbanks Daily News-Miner

Here are some maximum wind gusts reported Sunday (mostly in the evening) in Fairbanks-land:

Salcha River RAWS: 49 mph
Caribou Peak RAWS: 46 mph
Stuart Creek RAWS: 45 mph (east of Eielson)
Lincoln Creek Ridge PWS: 43 mph  (my neighbor across the hill)
Cleary Summit RWIS: 43 mph
Eielson AFB: 40 mph
Fairbanks Airport: 28 mph

The News-Miner reported some power outages in the area, and the winds brought the Dry Creek fire back to life, as seen in this dramatic photo taken about 930pm ADT Sunday from Chena Ridge.

The SNOTEL on Eagle Summit on the Steese Highway reported a peak wind of 65 mph, and in the Delta Junction area, Fort Greely had a peak wind of 71 mph with a 60 mph gust at the Bolio Lake RAWS.

Big Storm

Analysis from Environment Canada

A rapidly deepening storm in Bristol Bay brought a strong Chinook to the Interior Saturday night and Sunday (4am ADT analysis from Environment Canada on the right). After a week of near or below freezing morning lows, temperatures overnight in many low elevation places in the southern Interior failed to get out of the 50s Saturday night and Sunday morning.  It has been windy in and just to the lee of the mouths of the passes, and most places have had decent breeze. Through 10am ADT Sunday, peak winds reported include:

Fort Greely: 66 mph
Texas Condo: 64 mph (on west side of Donnelly Dome)
Bolio RAWS: 57 mph (near Bolio Lake)
Healy DOT: 48 mph
Otto Lake PWS: 42 mph (south of Healy)

In the Fairbanks area, the highest winds have been in the Eielson AFB area, with a gust to 40 mph at 10am Sunday. 

One more Cool Morning

Low temperatures Thursday morning were below freezing everywhere in the Fairbanks area. The Nenana Hills RWIS, which was the last observation site yet to have a freeze, dipped to 31F. Other lows include (thru 8am):

Goldstream Creek: 18F
Mile 43 Steese Highway: 23F
Fairbanks Airport: 26F
Eielson AFB: 26F
UAF West Ridge: 27F
Keystone Ridge: 31F
Cleary Summit: 34F

Arctic Sea Ice Approaching Summer Minimum

Courtesy of NSIDC

Here's the September 9th plot of Arctic sea ice coverage from the National Snow and Ice Data Center. As to be expected, the coverage is getting close to the seasonal minimum, and is, by far, the lowest coverage of the satellite era.

Frosty

Most of the Fairbanks area had a frost or freeze Saturday morning. At the Fairbanks Airport, the low of 29F made this the earliest "first autumn freeze" since 2005, though this is one day later than the long term median. The photo on the left is from here on Keystone Ridge about 8am Saturday, with frost on the dogwood.






Other lows in the area Saturday morning include:


Goldstream Creek: 22F
Chena Hot Springs: 25F
Eielson AFB: 26F
UAF West Ridge: 28F
Keystone Ridge: 33F
Clearly Summit: 35F

Updated Temperature Anomolies

Here's an updated plot of standardized mean daily temperature anomalies for Fairbanks. Warm anomalies have dominated since mid-August but with some cooler days interspersed, unlike, say much of July, when cool anomalies were unbroken except for late in the month.

Dry as the Airport

Amongst the weather weenies of the Interior, it is common knowledge that the Fairabnks Airport is often the driest place around. Of course it is not always the case, but it sure seem like it sometimes. This is not an ASOS issue; it has been a feature for a long time. I have a co-worker who installed a rain gauge in his back yard in the University West area in the 1980s because he was sure he was getting more rain that the Airport. So, in that vein, here are rainfall totals through the first six days of September, keeping in might it has rained some every day:

Fairbanks Airport: 0.17"
Lemeta (north of downtown) 0.20"
Fairbanks Midtown: 0.26"
North Pole: 0.28"
Gilmore Creek CRN: 0.46"
East Farmers Loop" 0.47"
Goldstream Valley Bottom: 0.54"
Keystone Ridge: 0.77"

Here It Comes

Photo courtesy of the FAA

Here's the 9am Thursday view from Eielson Visitors Center in Denali National Park, elevation 3650' MSL. This is not unusual for Eielson VC: accumulating snow occurs about once every in three Julys, and probably more than half of Augusts. Cool weather is here for a while at least, so it's possible, if unlikely, that this is the start of winter snowpack

Arctic Sea Ice

Courtesy of the University of Illinois

Unless you've been incommunicado the past couple weeks, you have probably heard that Arctic Sea Ice coverage is at the lowest of the satellite era, already lower than the 2007 minimum by quite a bit. Here is the Alaska-centric view from the University of Illinois Cryosphere today webpage. There is a small amount of low concentration ice northwest of Barrow, but it's going fast.

Fairbanks August Summary

NOAK49 PAFG 020014
PNSAFG
AKZ222-021215-

PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE FAIRBANKS AK
414 PM AKDT SAT SEP 1 2012

...AUGUST 2012 WEATHER SUMMARY FOR FAIRBANKS ALASKA...
...NEAR NORMAL TEMPERATURES AND BELOW NORMAL PRECIPITATION...

TEMPERATURES IN AUGUST WERE NEAR NORMAL. THE AVERAGE DAILY HIGH
TEMPERATURE WAS 66.5 DEGREES...WHILE THE AVERAGE LOW TEMPERATURE WAS
46 DEGREES. THE MONTHLY MEAN TEMPERATURE OF 56.3 DEGREES WAS JUST
2 TENTHS OF ONE DEGREE ABOVE NORMAL. THE HIGH TEMPERATURE FOR THE
MONTH WAS 78 DEGREES OBSERVED ON THE 14TH...WHILE THE LOW
TEMPERATURE WAS 37 DEGREES OBSERVED ON THE 22ND. SOME OF THE
TYPICALLY COLD LOW LYING AREAS DROPPED BELOW FREEZING ON THE
MORNING OF THE 22ND...INCLUDING LOWS OF 25 DEGREES AT ESTER
5NE...26 AT GOLDSTREAM CREEK AND 29 AT BOTH EIELSON AFB AND CHENA
HOT SPRINGS. URBAN AREAS AS WELL AS MOST HIGH ELEVATION SITES DID
NOT HAVE A FREEZE DURING AUGUST.

THE MONTH STARTED WITH A DECIDED LACK OF RAIN WITH ONLY 26
HUNDREDTHS OF AN INCH AT THE FAIRBANKS INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT THROUGH
THE 23RD.  ONLY 13 HUNDREDTHS OF AN INCH OF RAIN FELL DURING THE
ENTIRE TANANA VALLEY FAIR FROM THE 3RD THROUGH THE 12TH...AND ONLY
3 HUNDREDTHS OF AN INCH OF RAIN WAS OBSERVED AT NORTH POLE THROUGH
THE 23RD. THE LACK OF SIGNIFICANT RAIN ALLOWED THE DRY CREEK FIRE
11 MILES SOUTHWEST OF EIELSON AFB BASE TO SPRING BACK TO LIFE. THE
FIRE WAS INITIALLY STARTED ON JUNE 23RD BY LIGHTNING BUT REMAINED
INACTIVE DUE TO A COOL JULY. THE FIRE QUICKLY GREW DURING THE 3RD
WEEK OF AUGUST TO JUST OVER 40 THOUSAND ACRES BY AUGUST 24TH...AND
ENDED UP ACCOUNTING FOR NEARLY ONE SIXTH OF THE 249,021 ACRES THAT
BURNED STATEWIDE THIS SUMMER. SMOKE FROM THE FIRE MOVED INTO THE
FAIRBANKS AREA ON THE 18TH AND WAS NOTICEABLE AT TIMES DURING THE
NEXT SEVERAL DAYS...AND ALSO PRODUCED POOR AIR QUALITY AT TIMES.

WET WEATHER FINALLY MADE AN APPEARANCE IN THE FAIRBANKS AREA ON
THE 25TH AND 26TH WITH A TWO DAY TOTAL OF 1.07 INCHES OF RAIN. THE
82 HUNDREDTHS OF AN INCH OF RAIN THAT WAS OBSERVED ON THE 26TH WAS
THE WETTEST DAY IN FAIRBANKS IN OVER 2 YEARS SINCE JULY 21, 2010.
THE MONTH ENDED WITH A TOTAL OF 1.43 INCHES...WHICH WAS 43
HUNDREDTHS OF AN INCH BELOW NORMAL. NO THUNDERSTORMS WERE OBSERVED
AT THE AIRPORT THIS PAST AUGUST.

FOR THE METEOROLOGICAL SUMMER...WHICH IS THE 3-MONTH PERIOD OF JUNE
THROUGH AUGUST...THE AVERAGE TEMPERATURE WAS 59.5 DEGREES WHICH WAS
6 TENTHS OF A DEGREE BELOW NORMAL.  IT WAS THE COOLEST SUMMER SINCE
2008.  A TOTAL OF 4.56 INCHES OF RAIN WAS OBSERVED THIS PAST
SUMMER...WHICH WAS 83 HUNDREDTHS OF AN INCH BELOW NORMAL.  IT WAS
THE 9TH DRIEST SUMMER IN THE PAST 30 YEARS. THERE WERE ONLY 5 DAYS
THIS SUMMER WITH A HIGH TEMPERATURE OF 80 DEGREES OR WARMER...WELL
BELOW THE NORMAL OF 11. MANY RURAL LOW LYING AREAS HAD ONE OR MORE
MORNINGS WITH TEMPERATURES DOWN TO FREEZING EVERY MONTH THIS
SUMMER.

LOOKING AHEAD TO SEPTEMBER...TEMPERATURES COOL SIGNIFICANTLY.  THE
AVERAGE HIGH DROPS FROM 62 DEGREES ON THE FIRST TO 46 DEGREES ON THE
30TH.  SINCE 1905...SEPTEMBER TEMPERATURES HAVE RANGED FROM A HIGH
OF 84 IN 1957 TO A LOW OF 3 IN 1992. AVERAGE RAINFALL IS 1.1 INCHES
WITH AN AVERAGE SNOWFALL OF 1.8 INCHES. SNOW IS RARE DURING THE
FIRST 10 DAYS OF THE MONTH AT LOW ELEVATIONS...BUT THE CHANCE OF
SNOW INCREASES DURING THE SECOND HALF OF THE MONTH. 1992 IS STILL
REMEMBERED BY LONG TIME RESIDENTS WHEN WINTER ARRIVED EARLY WITH
SIGNIFICANT SNOWFALL AROUND MID MONTH...AND A TEN DAY TOTAL OF
OVER 2 FEET OF SNOW. MEASURABLE SNOWFALL HAS BEEN OBSERVED ON 19
OUT OF THE PAST 30 YEARS DURING THE MONTH OF SEPTEMBER...OR 63
PERCENT OF THE TIME. POSSIBLE SUNSHINE DECREASES FROM 14 HOURS AND
33 MINUTES ON THE FIRST TO 11 HOURS AND 21 MINUTES BY THE 30TH.

THE FORECAST FOR SEPTEMBER FROM THE CLIMATE PREDICTION CENTER CALLS
FOR AN INCREASED CHANCE OF ABOVE NORMAL PRECIPITATION.  THERE ARE NO
STRONG CLIMATE SIGNALS THAT INDICATE AN INCREASED CHANCE OF EITHER
ABOVE OR BELOW NORMAL TEMPERATURES.

Fog

After the rain Saturday (which did not amount to much in town), skies cleared and valley fog developed. Here are two views at nearly the same time, about 925am Sunday,  one from UAF West Ridge and one from atop Ester Dome. 

Some rainfall amounts Saturday included:

Fairbanks Airport: 0.01"
Eielsin AFB: 0.01"
Goldstream Creek: 0.10"
Gimore Creek CRN: 0.23"
Keystone Ridge: 0.28"
Caribou Peak RAWS: 0.43"

Rain in Fairbanks

Rain in the Fairbanks area started Friday afternoon, and by early Monday morning most places hard received a good soaking.

Weekend totals include:

Angel Creek RAWS: 2.06 inches
Keystone Ridge: 1.54 inches
Cleary Summit: 1.53 inches
Goldstream Creek: 1.29 inches
Fairbanks Airport: 1.12 inches
Eielson AFB: 1.02 inches

This goes a long ways toward wiping out the August rainfall deficit.

Dry Creek Fire

The Dry Creek fire was started by lightning June 23, but remained an inactive, insignificant fire (less than 500 acres) until mid-August. A stretch of warm weather, and a couple of days of brisk south wind, compounded with hardly any rain since late July, allowed the fire to spring to life and grow rapidly. As of Friday, August 24th, the Alaska Fire Service mapped the fire at just under 42,000 acres (map at right), making this the second largest fire of season in Alaska (the Uvgoon Creek fire in the Noatak valley was over 48,000 acres). Just to the southwest of Eielson AFB, the fire has burned right to banks of the Tanana. Happily, the Tanana here is wide and braided. On the negative side, the fire is perfectly placed to provide bouts of smoke for Fairbanks-land until the snow flies: any wind direction except northeast will push into some part of the area. The fire has received only small amounts of rain over the weekend, and while more will fall through Monday, the rain will be not be anywhere near enough to put out this fire. Warm, dry and  intermittently breezy weather is likely again by mid-week, which will undo what wetting has occurred.

Never in recent memory has a single fire sprung to life in mid-August and grown to account for so much of the total acreage burned in the state: the Dry Creek fire on August 11th accounted for less than 0.1% of the statewide acreage burned: as of Friday, it made up almost 17% of the 250,400 acres burned so far, and this will likely increase as there are no other active fires in the state (and have not been since late July). 

Why So Warm on the North Slope?

Courtesy of NCEP/NCAR Reanalysis

Long time reader Trung asked why it has been so warm on the North Slope this summer. The obvious answer would be that the record low sea ice coverage, but that in fact is probably only a small part of the answer. Ice has actually been more persistent in the Chukchi and far western Beaufort Sea than it has been in a few years, though what's left is rapidly melting now. More important has been the persistent trough aloft centered along about 170W longitude, the same feature responsible for the copious rains over much of western Alaska and the quasi-drought in the Interior. This can be seen in graphic to the right, which shows the mean wind direction (arrows) and speeds (color) at 700 mb (about 3000 meters above the ground) for July 1 through August 20 (speed units are meters per second). South winds blowing across the Brooks Range warm and dry as they descend onto the northern plain in a classic "chinook" effect. Barrow has had 15 days with a daily high temperature above 60F, which ties with 1989 and 1936 for the most such days. It is possible that  a new record could be set in the next ten days or so.

Clear skies and a cool airmass allowed for a more widespread a frost and freeze in the Fairbanks area than has hitherto been the case, though most of urban Fairbanks and hillside areas escaped.

Reported lows include:

Goldstream Creek: 26F
Eileson AFB: 29F
Chena Hot Springs: 29F
Mile 42 Steese Hwy: 32F
UAF West Ridge: 35F
Fort Wainwright: 36F
Fairbanks Airport: 37F
Keystone Ridge: 41F
Clearly Summit RWIS 43F

Here's a nice view from the top of Ester Dome about 6am Wednesday morning, with some thin ground fog on the flats: 

Photo courtesy of the FAA

Record Warmth at Barrow

Barrow has been remarkably mild this month. The high temperature Sunday of 66F was a new record high for August 19th. The low temperature of 48F was not only a record high minimum for the date but the fifth of the past six days to set a record high minimum. At the left is a plot of daily temperature extremes this month, with the 1981-2010 normals for comparison. During the past week low temperatures have been consistently running above the normal high, always a good indicator of extreme warmth.

Smoky in Fairbanks

The dry summer in Fairbanks is coming back to haunt us.  The Dry Creek fire, centered 11 miles southwest of Eielson AFB,  reportedly started by lightning June 23rd but dormant in July, sprang back to life a few days ago with the warm dry weather of late. The Alaska Fire Service now estimates 3000 acres burned, an increase of 2500 acres since Wednesday. The plume was visible from UAF for a while late Saturday morning, but soon became hidden by smoke as the fire was fanned by a southeast breeze, so directing the smoke directly toward Fairbanks. For a while Saturday afternoon visibility was under 15 miles from UAF West Ridge, as the buttes south of the river were obscured. Interestingly, the Saturday afternoon sounding from Fairabnks should a well defined inversion aloft, which served to trap the smoke in the lowest 2300 meters of the atmosphere.

Through Friday Fairbanks airport had received only 0.26 inches of rain thus far in August, and the Woodsmoke cooperative station, near North Pole had just 0.06 inches for the month.

Update: Here is a photo of the fire Sunday afternoon looking southeast from UAF West Ridge:

Denali Sunrise

Photo Courtesy of the FAA

Beautiful sunrise on Denali this morning as seen from Eielson Visitors Center. Low temp at the VC this AM was 41F.

The Deepening Night

Daily solar heating is decreasing rapidly now, and the effects of less daytime heating and longer nights are showing: it's almost getting (briefly) dark now. This is being accentuated by high pressure aloft, which is keeping skies mostly clear over the Interior: below is the 500mb analysis for 4am ADT Friday from Environment Canada, showing the elongated high centered about at 63N.

Updated Friday morning low temperatures in Fairbanks-land show a substantial nocturnal inversion and include:
Angel Creek RAWS: 28F
Goldstream Creek: 29F
Woodsmoke PWS: 32F (near North Pole)
UAF West Ridge: 39F
Eielson AFB: 39F
Fairbanks Airport: 42F
Keystone Ridge: 47F
Clearly Summit: 49F
Nenana Hills RWIS: 51F

Snow in Atigun Pass

Courtesy of the FAA

Alaska DOT reported four inches of new snow on the Dalton Highway on top of Atigun Pass (4700' MSL). The SNOTEL at the top of the pass reported a couple inches of snow on the snow pillow for a few hours Tuesday morning.. The 9am Tuesday webcam photo from Chandalar DOT looking northeast shows snow far down the shoulders of the mountains.

Deep Arctic Storm

1200 UTC Aug 06 2012 Analysis Courtesy of Environment Canada

A remarkably deep storm for the high Arctic brushed Alaska's North Slope Sunday and early Monday. To the right is the Monday 4am ADT (Aug 06 1200 UTC) analysis from Environment Canada, with a minimum sea level pressure of 964mb. Part of the reason for the extraordinarily low pressure was that very warm, moist air from Siberia, yes Siberia, was feed into the system as it developed over the East Siberian Sea on Saturday. The storm was too far north to do much for sea ice transport close to Alaska.

No Ice in Barrow

Winds have gone southwest at Barrow but as of Saturday morning ice has not made back to shore. The 4am ADT analysis from Environment Canada shows that the strongest west winds are far north of Barrow.

Courtesy Environment Canada

Courtesy UAF Ice Group

Barrow Ice Free

Courtesy of the UAF Sea Ice Group

Here's the UAF Sea Ice Group webcam photo from Barrow Thursday afternoon. In this limited view, I can't see any sea ice. A storm will be passing by to the north of Barrow Friday, which will bring winds around to the west, It will be interesting to see if ice reappears.

July Summary

PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE FAIRBANKS AK
1231 PM AKDT WED AUG 1 2012

...MONTHLY WEATHER SUMMARY FOR FAIRBANKS ALASKA...
...JULY WAS COOL WITH VARIABLE RAINFALL...

TEMPERATURES IN JULY WERE CONSISTENTLY COOL...WITH 20 DAYS HAVING
AN AVERAGE DAILY TEMPERATURE BELOW NORMAL. THE AVERAGE DAILY
HIGH TEMPERATURE WAS 69.7 DEGREES...A FULL THREE DEGREES BELOW NORMAL
AND MAKING THIS ONLY THE SIXTH JULY IN THE PAST 30 YEARS TO HAVE
AN AVERAGE HIGH IN JULY BELOW 70 DEGREES. THE AVERAGE LOW OF 52
DEGREES WAS ALMOST EXACTLY NORMAL. THE MONTHLY MEAN TEMPERATURE OF
60.8 WAS 1.7 DEGREES BELOW NORMAL AND MADE THIS THE COOLEST JULY
SINCE 2008. THE HIGHEST TEMPERATURE AT THE AIRPORT FOR THE MONTH
WAS 81 DEGREES ON THE 26TH...THE ONLY DAY IN JULY TO REACH INTO
THE 80S. THE LOW AT THE AIRPORT WAS 43 DEGREES ON THE 31ST. SOME
OF THE TYPICALLY COLD LOW LYING AREAS SAW ONE OR MORE MORNINGS
WITH TEMPERATURES DOWN TO FREEZING...INCLUDING LOWS OF 30 DEGREES
AT GOLDSTREAM CREEK AND 32 DEGREES AT WOODSMOKE...NEAR NORTH
POLE... ON THE MORNING OF THE 9TH.

RAINFALL WAS...AS IS TYPICAL IN THE SUMMER...QUITE VARIABLE AROUND
THE AREA. THE FAIRBANKS AIRPORT RECORDED 1.72 INCHES OF RAIN...ONLY
ABOUT 80 PERCENT OF NORMAL. MOST LOCATIONS HAD SOMEWHAT MORE RAIN THAN
THE AIRPORT AND SOME PLACES EAST OF FAIRBANKS WERE ACTUALLY SOMEWHAT
WETTER THAN NORMAL. AVAILABLE JULY RAINFALL TOTALS INCLUDE...

FAIRBANKS MIDTOWN..........1.87 INCHES (77 PERCENT OF NORMAL)
GOLDSTREAM CREEK...........2.24 INCHES
AURORA.....................2.28 INCHES (90 PERCENT OF NORMAL)
NORTH POLE.................2.30 INCHES (99 PERCENT OF NORMAL)
KEYSTONE RIDGE.............2.50 INCHES (75 PERCENT OF NORMAL)
EAST FARMERS LOOP..........2.55 INCHES
WOODSMOKE..................2.71 INCHES (108 PERCENT OF NORMAL)
EIELSON AFB................2.72 INCHES (115 PERCENT OF NORMAL)

THUNDERSTORMS WERE UNCOMMONLY RARE THIS MONTH...WITH THUNDER HEARD ON
ONLY ONE DAY AT THE AIRPORT. THE LIGHTNING DETECTION SYSTEM
OPERATED BY THE ALASKA FIRE SERVICE RECORDED FEWER STRIKES THIS
MONTH IN INTERIOR AND NORTHERN ALASKA THAN ANY JULY SINCE 2003.

THE COOL WEATHER AND LACK OF LIGHTNING BROUGHT THE 2012 FIRE SEASON TO
A NEAR STANDSTILL BY THE END OF THE MONTH. JUST OVER 207200 ACRES HAVE
BURNED IN ALASKA THUS FAR THIS SUMMER. THIS IS WELL BELOW NORMAL AND
THIS SUMMER IS VERY LIKELY TO FINISH UP WITH THE LOWEST ACREAGE BURNED
SINCE 2008.

LOOKING AHEAD TO AUGUST...TEMPERATURES START TO COOL SIGNIFICANTLY AS
NIGHTTIME DARKNESS RETURNS TO FAIRBANKS SKIES. THE AVERAGE HIGH
TEMPERATURE AT THE FAIRBANKS AIRPORT FALLS FROM 70 DEGREES ON THE FIRST
TO 62 DEGREES ON THE 31ST. AVERAGE DAILY LOW TEMPERATURES DROP FROM
50 DEGREES THE FIRST SEVERAL DAYS OF THE MONTH TO 41 DEGREES AT MONTHS
END. FROST AND FREEZES ARE INCREASINGLY POSSIBLE AS THE MONTH WEARS ON...
BUT THE FIRST FREEZE OFTEN DOES OCCUR IN MUCH OF URBAN FAIRBANKS AND IN
THE HILLS UNTIL SEPTEMBER. SINCE 1905...AUGUST TEMPERATURES HAVE RANGED
FROM A HIGH OF 93 DEGREES IN 1994 TO A LOW OF 21 DEGREES IN 1921.
AVERAGE RAINFALL AT THE AIRPORT IS 1.88 INCHES...SLIGHTLY LESS THAN THE
AVERAGE IN JULY. SNOW IS VERY RARE AT VALLEY LEVEL IN AUGUST BUT HAS
OCCURRED A FEW TIMES. THREE INCHES OF SNOW FELL AUGUST 29 1922...THE
ONLY OCCURRENCE OF MEASURABLE SNOW IN AUGUST IN FAIRBANKS IN MORE THAN
A CENTURY OF RECORDS. POSSIBLE SUNSHINE DECREASES FROM JUST OVER
18 HOURS ON THE FIRST TO 14 HOURS AND 40 MINUTES BY THE 31ST. THE
FIRST NORTHERN LIGHTS OF THE SEASON ARE OFTEN SEEN DURING THE LAST
TEN DAYS OF AUGUST.

THE FORECAST FOR AUGUST FROM THE CLIMATE PREDICTION CENTER CALLS FOR
SLIGHTLY INCREASED CHANCES OF SIGNIFICANTLY BELOW NORMAL TEMPERATURES
AND EQUAL CHANCES OF SIGNIFICANTLY BELOW...NEAR OR SIGNIFICANTLY ABOVE
NORMAL PRECIPITATION.