Here are a few things from the weather scene so far this season.
High winds affected various areas of the state with gusts of 98mph at McHugh Creek, 91 at both Near Golden View and Cape Newenham, and 87 at Glen Alps. See more on winds HERE.
Many areas experience temperatures much higher than average. King Salmon reached 47 (ave high 30). Valdez reached 41 degrees Dec 30th.
Anchorage had the second-warmest year on record, reaching 45 degrees Dec. 29th.
Read about it HERE.
Warm weather across much of Alaska broke temperature records at the end of December.
Temperatures spike almost 50 degrees in North Pole.
Read story HERE
We’ve seen the rain in Valdez, but other areas have experienced higher than average rainfall as well.
AccuWeather- A series of storms will bring welcome rainfall across California and other portions of the southwestern United States this week. While rainfall will be measured in inches from California and into parts of Arizona, these storms will not erase the drought across the Southwest.
CLICK HERE for the article
Huffington Post- The El Niño of 1997-98 was the worst on record. It caused an estimated 23,000 deaths worldwide as widespread drought, flooding and other natural disasters rocked the globe.
The catastrophic weather system also caused the most devastating coral bleaching in recorded history, killing off about 16 percent of the world’s reef systems. In the U.S., the total economic impact of that year’s El Niño was between $10 billion and $25 billion.
Sounds bad? Well, according to NASA, we may now be facing an equally-destructive El Niño; one that’s poised to only worsen in the first few months of 2016. Read article HERE
NASA- The current strong El Niño brewing in the Pacific Ocean shows no signs of waning, as seen in the latest satellite image from the U.S./European Ocean Surface Topography Mission (OSTM)/Jason-2 mission.
El Niño 2015 has already created weather chaos around the world. Over the next few months, forecasters expect the United States to feel its impacts as well.
Read more HERE
Weather.com- WSI, a division of The Weather Company, issued their January through March 2016 outlook update, and both forecast temperatures and precipitation have the fingerprints of the current strong El Niño, the strongest in 18 years, all over them. The forecast includes the potential for a significant cold snap in parts of the central and eastern states starting in the middle portion of January.
Stronger El Niños typically exhibit their peak influence on North America’s weather pattern during the core winter months.
Keep in mind, however, there are several other factors in the atmosphere, operating on shorter time scales, that can, at times, oppose the overall three-month trend.
Read article HERE
