Sunrise 5:08 AM   Sunset 10:42 PM Moonrise 9:17 AM   Moonset 2:34 AM

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PKZ140 Cook Inlet North Of Kalgin Island- 401 Am Akst Wed Mar 8 2023
Today - Variable wind less than 10 kt.Tonight - Variable wind less than 10 kt.Thu - Variable wind less than 10 kt becoming N 10 kt in the afternoon.Thu night - N wind 20 kt.Fri through Sat - N wind 25 kt.Sun - N wind 20 kt.

PKZ100
No data

FXAK68 PAFC 150136 AFDAFC

Southcentral and Southwest Alaska Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Anchorage AK 536 PM AKDT Tue May 14 2024

.SHORT TERM FORECAST SOUTHCENTRAL ALASKA (Days 1 through 3/Today through Thursday night)...

The forecast is remaining on track with showers, partly to mostly sunny skies, and warm temperatures until Thursday. Agreement is coming together for the front to develop a surface low near Kodiak Island that would increase the chance for precipitation on Thursday for Kodiak and the Kenai Peninsula. QPF will still be on the light end. Precipitation chances spread north and east for Friday. rux

Previous Southcentral discussion: The cold upper level low responsible for showers (and a few thunderstorms with hail) over Southcentral yesterday is exiting south into the Gulf this morning. Vorticity-maxima rotating around the north side of the low continue to produce isolated showers early this morning, primarily from the Talkeetna Mountains south to the Mat Valley and through Tahneta Pass into the western Copper River Basin. Meanwhile, a surface low over the northeastern Gulf is being pulled back westward toward the upper low center.
Middleton Island radar imagery shows a North-South oriented band of rain tracking westward across the northern Gulf and southeastern Prince William Sound, including Cordova. Further west, mostly clear skies can be found from Kodiak Island north to the Kenai Peninsula and much of the Susitna Valley.
Temperatures have once again dropped into the 30s, with isolated areas down below freezing.

The upper level low will exit eastward across the Gulf today, though cyclonic flow aloft, with embedded vorticity.maxima will continue to transit Southcentral. Slightly warmer temperatures in the upper atmosphere means conditions won't be quite as unstable today as they were yesterday. Still expect increasing showers this afternoon, but fewer showers than Monday and no thunderstorms. The favored areas for scattered showers will be the Mat-Su near the Talkeetna Mountains (roughly Willow to Palmer) along with the Copper River Basin - especially along the Tok Cutoff and north side of the Wrangell Mountains.

An upstream ridge of high pressure will build eastward tonight, then move overhead of Southcentral on Wednesday. This will cap off convection and lead to widespread sunny skies and warm temperatures. With a surface high building up from the Gulf, expect stronger sea breezes along the coast. This will lead to somewhat cooler temperatures for coastal communities compared to inland areas.

A dissipating front from a deep low in the Bering Sea will approach Kodiak Island and the western Gulf on Thursday. There will be very little forcing left, but likely enough to produce areas of very light rain. This will also lead to increasing clouds across the western tier of Southcentral Thursday through Thursday night. Model spread is quiet large with regard to the eastward progression of the long-wave trough and handling of individual short-waves. Thus, it is not clear whether any precipitation will make it up to Southcentral.

-SEB

.SHORT TERM FORECAST SOUTHWEST ALASKA, THE BERING SEA AND THE ALEUTIANS (Days 1 through 3/ Today through Thursday morning)...

A Kamchatka Low will continue to bring precipitation, gusty winds and periods of cloudy skies to the area through tomorrow evening.
The weak ridge over the Alaska Peninsula continues to move eastward as the cold front from this Kamchatka Low moves through the Central/Eastern Aleutians, Southwest Alaska and the Alaska Peninsula. Winds will continue to impact these areas and along the Southwest coastline northward to Mekoryuk today. Through tomorrow morning, the winds will shift to a more westerly/northwesterly direction as the front passes. Widespread winds gusting from 30 to 40 mph and stronger winds (gusts to 55 mph) are expected around Mekoryuk and Toksook Bay through late tomorrow morning. There will be a sharp cutoff of strong winds with most areas from Bethel south to New Stuyahok eastward ranging from 15 to 25 mph through tomorrow morning. Afterward, winds will be light and calm.

Precipitation type will continue as periods of snow and rain.
Temperatures at 850mb, which is used as an indication for advection of cold air into a region, has been trending downward the past few model runs. This translates to a greater chance of a rain/snow mix this evening into late tomorrow morning. A switch to rain tomorrow afternoon is likely as temperatures warm for the late morning and afternoon hours. However, an evening change back to a rain/snow mix is expected. A trace accumulation of snow is expected through tomorrow evening for most places with 1 to 3 inches for Mekoryuk and Toksook Bay this evening through tomorrow morning. The highest QPF values are expected to be in the the Togiak and Goodnews Bay area where 0.50" to 1.00" will fall Wednesday through early Thursday morning. Elsewhere, QPF amounts will be closer to 0.10" through Thursday morning. In addition to the Kamchatka Low, a wave crosses the Central Aleutians/Alaska Peninsula tomorrow afternoon into Thursday morning resulting in a brief period of brief precipitation. QPF amounts from this wave range from a trace to 0.10".

-DJ

.LONG TERM FORECAST (Days 4 through 7: Friday through Tuesday)...

The long term forecast for the Southern Alaska will begin with a ridge over the Gulf of Alaska sliding east as a shortwave trough rounds the base of a longwave upper-level trough situated over the Bering and moves over Southwest Alaska. Model agreement regarding the associated frontal boundary moving across the Aleutians is mild, as a few of the models are slightly stronger than others.
However, the timing regarding this system is fairly well agreed upon, with this system then exiting to the east late Saturday.

Sunday may offer a reprieve from any extensive cloud cover and/or shower activity across the Southern Mainland. But, again, all models are struggling with the track of various shortwaves embedded within the longwave trough. While guidance shows a ridge trying to build north from the North Pacific and western Gulf, the GFS is advertising a quicker breakdown of the ridge, a common and usually incorrect bias. This solution is still possible, and would place the entirety of the Southern Mainland on the back side of the ridge with the resultant southwesterly flow lending to a more unsettled pattern with various waves moving along the Aleutian Chain and across the AKPen and Kodiak Island. The result would be more cloud cover and chances for rain across the region.
Given the consistency of the latest GFS runs and a trend of the EC and GEM ensembles progressively leaning more toward the GFS recently, the long term is weighted more toward the stronger ridge solution.

For the Aleutians and Bering, the longwave trough situated over the region will like keep conditions cool and unsettled through the long term. Any ridging between storm systems would be brief, with the best chance for high pressure over the Bering late Friday into Saturday. Any warmer air associated with the ridge, though, would likely result in widespread stratus and fog due to the warmer air riding over the cold open waters. By the beginning of next week, uncertainty between the models grows with regards to a low pressure system entering the western Bering Sea, and the subsequent progression of the system across the Aleutians, is currently high. It is looking like the pattern of training troughs across the Bering will continue into the next work week.

-TM/CL

AVIATION

PANC...VFR conditions and light winds, generally less than 10 kts, will persist through the TAF period.

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Kenai City Pier
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Tue -- 04:26 AM AKDT     6.24 feet Low Tide
Tue -- 04:34 AM AKDT     Moonset
Tue -- 05:23 AM AKDT     Sunrise
Tue -- 09:16 AM AKDT     15.99 feet High Tide
Tue -- 11:15 AM AKDT     Moonrise
Tue -- 05:05 PM AKDT     2.11 feet Low Tide
Tue -- 10:40 PM AKDT     Sunset
Tue -- 10:59 PM AKDT     15.43 feet High Tide
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Kenai City Pier, Alaska, Tide feet

Nikiski
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Tue -- 04:09 AM AKDT     7.60 feet Low Tide
Tue -- 04:36 AM AKDT     Moonset
Tue -- 05:23 AM AKDT     Sunrise
Tue -- 09:56 AM AKDT     16.59 feet High Tide
Tue -- 11:15 AM AKDT     Moonrise
Tue -- 04:45 PM AKDT     2.64 feet Low Tide
Tue -- 10:42 PM AKDT     Sunset
Tue -- 11:25 PM AKDT     17.67 feet High Tide
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Nikiski, Cook Inlet, Alaska, Tide feet

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