Climate normals and the Arctic is this week's topic for the Alaska and Arctic Climate Newsletter. What does "normal" even mean in a rapidly warming environment? Well, that probably depends on your perspective. #Arctic#ClimateChange @Climatologist49
Arctic 12-month running temperatures as the difference from the 1951-80 average, updated through April 2024. The 10-year smoothed average shows the long term trend, the 2-year average captures some of the short term variability. OISSTv2.1 courtesy of NOAA/PSL/ESRL
ERA5 courtesy of ECMWF/Copernicus. #Arctic#ClimateChange#Climate @Climatologist49
A sure sign that contemporary 30-year climate normals are not keeping up with the rate of Arctic change: only one year (2021) since the early 1990s has less than half of land area in the Arctic (north of 60ºN) had annual average temperature above “normal", and eight years more than 90 percent of Arctic Lands were warmer than “normal". In an unchanging climate, this would bounce around 50% each year. #Arctic#ClimateChange
H/T @Climatologist49
If you’re in Fairbanks, come by UAF for the Research Open House Thursday evening 4-7pm AKDT. I’ll be staffing a table in the Akasofu Building lobby, so stop by and let’s talk climate! #akwx#UAF#Alaska
Fairbanks Airport up to 66F (18.9C) through 5pm Wednesday, the highest temperature since September 9th. Webcam image courtesy explorefairbanks.com #akwx#Weather#Alaska
Unusually strong storm for mid-May moving across the Bering Sea Tuesday. Blizzard conditions already at St. Lawrence Island and likely later today in the Bering Strait. This gif courtesy NWS Alaska Region. #akwx#weather#spring2024 @Climatologist49@BakerRL75
Sea ice extent in the Bering Sea remains close to 1991-2020 median in NSIDC data. Large areas of open water north of the ice edge are normal this time of year. The lack of any significant areas of lower concentration ice in the southern Chukchi Sea is unusual for this point in the Spring. #akwx#Arctic#SeaIce#Climate @Climatologist49@ZLabe
Sea surface temperatures departures from the 1991-2020 average around Alaska for the week ending May 10, 2024. Northern Bering Sea mostly below normal and partially sea ice influenced. Eastern Gulf of Alaska warmer than average. Data from OISSTv2.1 courtesy of NOAA/PSL/ESRL. #SST#akwx#Arctic
About a two mile strip of shorefast sea ice hanging on at Nome Saturday late afternoon. Beyond that open water, just visible as a thin dark blue line on the Nome CVB webcam looking across Front Street to Norton Sound beyond. 5pm weather 35F (+1.7C), slight sea breeze. #SeaIce#akwx#Alaska
Western Alaska had another high precipitation early spring this year, making six out of the past seven March-Aprils with high end precipitation. I've got a Alaska and Arctic Climate Newsletter posted that investigates "is this just random variation or is something different."