Marine Weather and Tide Forecast for Elfin Cove, AK

SYNOPSIS

Key Messages:

- Band of showers moving through the southern half of the panhandle through Friday. Accumulations are possible that Advisories have been add for Prince of Wales Island and Southern Inner channels.

SHORT TERM
/ through Friday night / The broad multiple low complex in the gulf continues with a slow weakening of the feature through Friday. The small meso lows can and have spun off weak showers and light snow around Yakutat and Sitka to Dixon Entrance.
THe shower activity along Prince of Wales Island this evening and overnight is looking like there could be better chance for accumulations, especially near stronger showers or where showers may continually move over the same terrain. So have issued advisories for the Prince of Wales Island and the Southern Inner Channels tonight and Friday for 2 to 3 inches of accumulations from the showers.

Gusty winds down Lynn Canal tonight impacting Haines and Skagway with gusts 25 to 30 mph, and to about 45 mph for Pt Couverden to early Friday morning.

LONG TERM
A return to the active weather pattern looms on the horizon, as a strong system advances into the panhandle on Sunday. Driven northward as it rides along the eastern flank of a deepening positively tilted trough located over the western Gulf, ensemble guidance has locked into the potential for a ~980 decameter low to make landfall somewhere along the Gulf Coast; though the exact location is still not yet set in stone.

The big stories for the panhandle with this system will be the snow and wind. The strongest winds will be across the southern half of SE AK, and gusts of up to 35 kt or higher may be possible for for these areas, along with parts of the Outer Gulf Coast. Snow will be more widespread, with anywhere from 3-12 inches possible for areas near sea level through Monday. Snow totals will be generally higher further south, but this will need to be watched closely, as the final track of the low will have significant impacts on the snow totals. A changeover to rain or a rain snow mix is possible for the southern panhandle Sunday afternoon onwards as warm air advection attempts to push north, but expect cooler conditions will prevail over the northern half of SE AK.

Beyond this, we enter back into a pattern favorable for convective showers will looks set to last through the remainder of the week, as a low spins up over the northern Gulf. These showers will bring accumulating snow at times, with potential impacts to maritime and aviation concerns. The southern panhandle concurrently looks set to receive stronger surges of moisture, as systems racing along the flank of the southern stream jet are able to side-swipe the area.

AVIATION
/through Friday night/...The panhandle is split halfway in terms of conditions. The northern half, above but not including Sitka and Angoon, is still largely VFR with clearing skies and good VIS. Skagway and Haines have had gusty northerly outflow winds of 20 to 25 kts through the night, which is expected to continue into the afternoon Friday. Outflow winds are expected to start to weaken Friday night, so winds will be on a diminishing trend through the afternoon. For the southern half, below and including Sitka and Angoon, a meso low in the eastern gulf around 30 to 50 NM off the coast of Baranof Island has continued to produce light to moderate snow showers visible on both satellite and radar imagery. These showers are bringing conditions down to MVFR and IFR by reducing VIS to 1 SM or less with CIGs around 3000 ft. While the main band has been consistently pushing into Sitka over the past few hours which has brought conditions up and down, the rest of the southern panhandle has just started to follow suit. A heavier band of showers pushed through PoW Island and made it to both Petersburg and Ketchikan, bringing conditions down briefly to 2 SM with CIGs around 1500 ft.
These conditions are expected to continue for the southern panhandle as another shortwave trough brings more organized snow shower activity overnight and through Friday morning. Conditions will steadily improve through Friday afternoon for the areas impacted by showers.

MARINE
Inside Waters (Inner Channels): Gusty outflow winds down Lynn Canal tonight and early part of Friday tapering off to 20 kt or less by afternoon. Sustained winds 25 to 30 kt, although Rocky Island is hovering near Gale force. Gusts to 45 kt at Rocky will continue through the evening. Due to the continued winds in Lynn Canal used the fully developed seas tool to increase seas there, but trimmed back slightly through the Friday morning. The southern half of the inner channel speeds are 10 to 20 kt and will also decrease through the Friday time frame.

Outside Waters (Eastern Gulf & Outer Coastal Waters): Winds out over the gulf waters are mainly 10 to 20 kt, with some 25 kt outflow streaming from Dangerous River near Yakutat and Cross Sound Thursday evening. Seas are lowering down under 8 feet and look to decrease to about 5 ft by Friday afternoon.

AJK WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES
PUBLIC...Winter Weather Advisory until 10 AM AKDT Friday for AKZ328.
Winter Weather Advisory until 4 PM AKDT Friday for AKZ330.
MARINE...Small Craft Advisory for PKZ012-013-022-031-644-664-671-672.