Winter's chill comes early as Fairbanks records fourth-coldest October
Originally published Monday, November 3, 2008 at 2:12 p.m.
Updated Tuesday, November 4, 2008 at 12:00 a.m.
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Stumble It!FAIRBANKS — One of the coldest Octobers on record in the Interior has the Yukon River grinding to a halt and residents settling in for winter.
October 2008 went down as Fairbanks’ fourth-coldest October on record since 1904, according to meteorologist Rick Thoman with the National Weather Service in Fairbanks. The average temperature of 15.1 degrees was 8.4 degrees below normal.
The coldest October on record in Fairbanks was in 1996, which had an average temperature of 13.1 degrees.
“That year we had three days in a row with lows in the mid 20s below,” Thoman recalled. “We didn’t have anything quite like that this year.
“It was just persistently below-normal temperatures rather than some great cold outbreak,” he said. “There were no records set.”
The low temperature for the month at Fairbanks International Airport, the weather service’s official measuring station in Fairbanks, was 13 below — recorded on Oct. 29 and well shy of October’s record low: 28 below, set on Oct. 27, 1935.
There were 13 days when the low temperature was zero or colder, the most sub-zero days in October since 1965, which holds the record of 14 sub-zero days in October and ranks as the second-coldest October on record.
“The number of days below zero was notable,” Thoman said.
Only two days during the month saw temperatures above normal, the result of a chinook that blew into the Interior from the Gulf of Alaska on Oct. 10-11 and pushed temperatures into the high 40s before dropping again.
Had it not been for the chinook, this October likely would have made the top three coldest Octobers on record, Thoman said. The warm blast of air also prevented Fairbanks from having one of its earliest snowpacks on record by melting about 4 inches of snow that had fallen the week before, Thoman said.
As it was, the snowpack was established on Oct. 13. Total snowfall for the month was 12.2 inches, which is just slightly above normal.
The colder weather froze Interior lakes quicker and deeper than usual, but rivers are still in the process of freezing solid, said Larry Rundquist at the National River Forecast Center in Anchorage.
The ice on the Yukon River has stopped moving in several Interior villages, including Circle, Galena, Tanana and Nulato, Rundquist reported. The ice on the Tanana River at Manley stopped running on Oct. 23, he said.
The early part of winter has been much colder this year than normal in terms of “freezing degree days,” which Rundquist said are the driver for freeze-up and ice thickness. Freezing degree days are accumulated when the average daily temperature drops below 32 degrees. One freezing degree day is the equivalent of one degree below freezing. For example, if the average daily temperature is 22 degrees, it equals 10 freezing degree days.
Fairbanks accumulated 600 freezing degree days in October this year, compared to an average of 260, Rundquist said.
In the Interior village of Eagle, on the Yukon River near the Canadian border, the coldest temperature in October was 24 below, said resident John Borg, who reports temperatures to the National Weather Service.
The Yukon River ice hasn’t frozen completely yet, but it won’t be long, Borg said.
“The ice isn’t packed in shoulder to shoulder yet,” he said by phone on Monday. “It’s got a ways to go yet. I’d say a minimum of two weeks unless we get some severe cold weather.”
Most of the 150 or so residents in the town at the end of the 160-mile Taylor Highway have settled in for the winter, he said. The road, which isn’t maintained in the winter, is pretty much impassable at this point, he said.
“Most everybody planning to be here for the winter is on this side of the summit,” he said, referring to 3,650-foot American Summit.
Contact staff writer Tim Mowry at 459-7587.
Community Discussion
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Hmmm.....do I have to say it...
Go ahead and be the first.
Here we go, let the fun begin!
Okay.....where the heck is Al Gore when you need him?
haha lagirl, you're so funny! *NOT*
Did you happen the read the last paragraph? Something about "lack of sea ice"... Now how do you suppose it happened that we are lacking so much sea ice?
Also, you apparently still need to do more research on the difference between "local" weather patterns and "global" weather patterns.
Ever heard the story about the 3 blind men trying to identify an elephant? You might want to think about what it represents.
I've never heard the story actually, can you tell us more?
There are lots of versions...
Here's a simple one:
One day, a rajah’s son asked, “Father, what is reality?”
“An excellent question, my son. Come, we will go to the marketplace.”
So the rajah and his son went outside and mounted their royal elephant. When they got to the marketplace, the rajah commanded, “Bring me 3 blind men.” When the blind men arrived, the rajah commanded, “Place one blind man at the elephant’s tusk, one at the elephant’s leg and one at the elephant’s tail.” When that was done, the rajah said, “Describe the elephant to me, blind men.”
The man at the tusk said, “It’s like a spear.” The man at the leg said, “It’s like a tree.” The man at the tail said, “It’s like a rope.”
As the men started to argue, the rajah said to his son, “Reality, my son, is the elephant. And we are all blind men.”
----
The point is, by looking at one small piece of the puzzle (for instance, the weather in Fairbanks in the last month) one can not possibly grasp the entire large picture being formed (like the absence or presence of a global climate change phenomenon).
Why is the global warming crowd so adamant that they must be right, and so unwilling to admit that maybe, just maybe, it's a natural cycle?
pragmatist, I absolutely agree with you -- 100%
My counter question: why is it that despite drastically receding polar ice caps, some of the largest storms ever recorded, instabilities in tundra, marauding polar bears, and other evidence that some people refuse to admit that any climate change is even taking place?
[Note: I do, have not, and will not speculate as to the cause.]
Should read "Note: I do not, have not, and will not..."
Newsreader,
I think a lot of people will admit that change is taking place (not all, true), but the jury is still out on the cause. Some would have you believe that it is 100% mankind's fault, but there just isn't enough recorded evidence to say.
Anyone that would say Global Climate Change doesn't exist (climates change all the time, warmer and cooler) hasn't looked at the numbers, and anyone that states that it is entirely man's fault doesn't understand climate change or the scientific method. There's just far too many causes to make for a correlation with the available data.
So it sounds like we agree. That kind of throws me off guard :)
"Note: I do not, have not, and will not..."
If you are not speculating as to what the causes are why wouldn't you think my comments were funny? Seems to me that you ARE speculating in the direction of global warming.
BTW--pragmatist--I agree with you (just for the record).
The climate on this planet changes. Hot/Cold
Cold/hot.
One day Greenland, the North and South poles may thaw and we will leave the current ice age.
Be thankful for the current interglacial warm spell!
Recommended Reading:
"Greenland Ice Core Analysis Shows Drastic Climate Change Near End Of Last Ice Age
ScienceDaily (June 19, 2008) — Information gleaned from a Greenland ice core by an international science team shows that two huge Northern Hemisphere temperature spikes prior to the close of the last ice age some 11,500 years ago were tied to fundamental shifts in atmospheric circulation. [... snip...]"
See also:
Earth & Climate
* Climate
* Global Warming
* Ice Ages
* Environmental Issues
* Atmosphere
* Oceanography
Reference
* Greenland ice sheet
* Ice sheet
* Temperature record
* Ice shelf"
Source:
-http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/06/080619142112.htm
I work outdoors. Every day that I am freezing my toucas off, inside I'm secretly laughing at man-made global warming advocates. Now climate change, that's a whole different matter.
This weather pattern isn't just Fairbanks. It's all across North America and Europe. Maybe it's getting warmer down by the equator.
--------
newsreader---
I resent your parables describing elephants. What gives you the right to have parables, but not Christians? Elephants have caused much more pain and misery than I could ever describe, or you could ever believe. How dare you push your beliefs on anyone else.
Way too much CO2 in the atmosphere and increasing exponentially every year...that is the man made part imo. We are throwing everything out of balance which is why it is happening so fast! Cyclic, oh yes, but we are definitely accellerating the issue with CO2 emmission. I'm just sad that I have to go more than a mile and a half further than I did 19 years ago to see the same glacier in Valdez.
There are as many volumes supporting climate change as there are against it. It is not man made!
When I was in grade school they were teaching us that we would
be in another ice age. I guess that wasn't making somebody like
the old bum Gore any money, so they came up with the next best
thing to make money and that is "global warming."
Do some of you not realize this is a scare tactic to take your
hard earned money from you.
The climate does change and that's just the way it is.
GET OVER IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
FYI.. CO2 was about 5 times the current level 60 million years ago and the temperature at the North Pole was +70.
The UN says the Earth will be 5-7 degrees warmer a 100 years from now. Anyone reading this discussion have a thermometer that can measure the outdoor temperature to .05 F from this date and time to the same date and time next year?
At 7:36 pm the temperature at my location 10 or 9.9 F my thermometer can't make up it's mind!
It is located 5' above ground. In a sheltered area on a hill side 465'(?) above sea level. It is calibrated relative to snow/water mixture at 31.7 and a medical thermometer reading 98.6 F. The sensor was not touching the artery under my tongue during the calibration process.
It is now 7:49 pm and it reads 9.5 F. Probably because this lump air is colder.
ACS time/temp says 12F at 7:54 pm
Which thermometer is correct? Since there is a 2.5 degree difference.
There are other things effecting the reading of a thermometer such as heat from the sun, heat from the building, heat from my hand, and wind speed, lumps of hot/cold air -- these at just things I know about! I am sure there are other factors in play-such as aging of the sensor and the temperature of it's electronic components.
Now imagine 100,000 thousand thermometers in a 100,000 locations spread all over the world. None of them exactly identical or in an identical location.
There are to many uncontrolled variables in play.
It is my understanding the core samples are only accurate to maybe 100 year increments and the current warming trend seems to have started after the Little Ice Age ended in the early 1800's.
The current temperatures are have not reached the temperatures prior to the Little Ice Age.
glacierles writes: "Elephants have caused much more pain and misery than I could ever describe, or you could ever believe."
Come on, G-Man, I thought you were a Republican.
And on the eve of an election no less.
how about this....
suppose global warming is totally man caused and not just part of a natural cycle. to stop this we totally shut all of america down. zero green house gas emissions. now.... what do we do about asia? china with a population 5 times that of america puts out far more green house gasses that we could ever hope to. india with over 3 times our population is just discovering the joys of driving to work now that all of our old jobs are being outsourced there. how are you going to convince the chinese that they can't industrialize. you might have more luck with the indians. at least they won't throw you in a deep dark prison. so america is totally shut down and your house is cold and dark and your children are starving.... that is if they haven't frozen to death yet. no matter... your job is long gone even if there was electricity or heating fuel available to buy.
better just figure out how you are going to adapt to a warmer planet instead of whining about something that is inevitable with or without man in the picture. because the fact is, the planet DOES change with or with out our input or output. the dinosaurs could tell you all about this, that is they could if they had been able to adapt. are you?
Not the good elephants!
Tue: 7:58 am
ACS 12 F Me 10.7
1.3 Difference
Definite scientific prof of global warming in one night at my location!
A colder Alaska is a healthier Alaska.
I have found this article on http://www.icecap.us/index.php
Anybody interested in climate info pay a visit.
Also very interesting: http://wattsupwiththat.com
For your information:
The arctic sea ice is back on level again, No, it was not CO2 but wind and warmer ocean currents that melted the ice in 2007.
We are now in for a negative PDO for the next 30 years which i the primary reason the planet has been cooling for the last years.
Have a nice winter
In the mean time our sun's magnetic activity is extremely low and so is the number of sunspots (transition phase between solar cycle 23-24.
Experts predict cycle 24 will be relative weak compared to the previous cycles.
Weak cycles and low sunspot numbers could mean a new Dalton or Maunder Minimum
(little Ice Age)
So, great to know you're State has a lot of oil and gas to keep us warm.
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