Yes, droughts have been increasing in Alaska in recent years, but indicating the various levels can be tricky since Alaska is a big state, and weather can dramatically flip from one set of conditions to another in a short period of time.
ANCHORAGE, Alaska - During the weather reports on Alaska’s News Source, our weather team has used the word drought several times in the last couple of months, as well as showing viewers the latest drought severity level on the statewide map.
“We all kind of put our heads together, and we look at the conditions, how dry things are, we look at the Alaska Fire Service and their ratings for how flammable things are. We do look at and we listen to people and communities about maybe are their water supply reservoirs low? Or are they having hydroelectric generation issues? So we take a lot of that into account,” said Brian Brettschneider, Climatologist with the National Weather Service’s Alaska Region.
“When we think about summer drought, we really start the slate clean once the snow is finally gone,” Brettschneider said. “And once that happened here, in the spring, the precipitation just really shut down for about two and a half months.” “Sometimes when you come out of a drought, the maps can be a little bit behind because it’s hard to know exactly, and then the timing of when they’re released,” Brettschneider said. “You know, you may have three inches of rain between when you send them the report, when the maps published, and people were like, whoa, you’re still saying we’re in a slight drought. Look at all the rain now. So it can be a little bit tricky to interpret in real-time.
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