By SHANNON HAUGLAND
Sentinel Staff Writer
Sitka may be heading toward record cold temperatures, sinking into the low teens starting tonight. But forecasters said it depends on a number of factors.
“Everyone is seeing below normal temperatures now,” said meteorologist Caleb Cravens, at the National Weather Service in Juneau.
At press time today, the service issued a winter storm warning through 10 p.m. for Sitka and areas south, with the heaviest snow amounts expected farther south.
Temperatures, in the mid to upper 20s here today, were expected to drop starting tonight into the low to mid teens, and continue throughout Tuesday, Cravens said.
However, on Wednesday temperatures are expected to rise back into the 20s, and weather to be clear for most of the week.
Sitka got intermittent snow showers during the night and this morning, but skies are expected to clear starting tonight for “high and dry” conditions throughout the week.
“It really depends on how long this sky cover sticks around,” Cravens said. “We’re already seeing more cloud cover now than we were expecting. The low off the coast is a little stronger than we expected and it’s causing a little more cloud cover. The temperatures tonight will really depend on how fast this cloud cover can move out. If the clouds stay around through the night it’s not going to get that low, but if they don’t it’s going to plummet. ... Currently we’re in the ‘wait and see.’”
Sitka usually ranges between 32 to 40 degrees on this week of the year, records show. The lowest temp for Feb. 7, for example, is 15 degrees.
Juneau and communities farther north are expected to see the worst of it, with temperatures in the single digits. North of Juneau - Haines and Skagway - the weather service expects temperatures around 0 tonight and in the single digits for Tuesday.
“With the wind, it will feel like 30 to 40 degrees below zero,” Cravens said.
As expected, the region is seeing scattered snow showers today.
The weather service in recent days has been keeping its eye on the wind throughout the region as well.
“Winds are blowing out of the north pretty strongly,” Cravens said. “We have high pressure in Canada - abnormally strong, pretty rare - and we have low pressure in the Gulf. Since the pressure differences are so strong, it causes really tight gradients between the two. The tighter the pressure gradients the stronger the winds are.”
Another factor creating strong winds are temperature differences.
“We have really low temperatures in Canada right now (in the negative teens in the Yukon), and temperatures over the Gulf in the 30s,” he said. “When you have that big of a temperature difference, it causes increasing winds.”
Sitka is somewhat blocked from the higher winds by the mountains, but should continue to get gusts of 30 mph, decreasing Tuesday.
Cravens said the weather service will continue updating the forecast as more information becomes available.
He recommended having a “cold weather kit,” such as supplemental heat sources at home, food and water, and a NOAA weather radio, in case of power outages.
