Alaska gets its first ever heat advisory
ANCHORAGE, ALASKA—For the first time ever, parts of Alaska will be under a heat advisory—but you can put an asterisk at the end of that term.
It’s not the first instance of unusually high temperatures in what many consider the nation’s coldest state, but the National Weather Service only recently allowed heat advisories to be issued there.
Information on similarly warm weather conditions previously came in the form of “special weather statements.”
Using the heat advisory label could help people better understand the weather’s severity and potential danger, something a nondescript “special weather statement” didn’t convey.
The inaugural heat advisory is for Sunday in Fairbanks, where temperatures are expected to top 29 degrees Celsius. Fairbanks had been warmer in the past, but this is unusual for June, officials said.
The National Weather Service’s switch from special weather statements to advisories was meant to change how the public views the information.
‘Correct communication’
“This is an important statement, and the public needs to know that there will be increasing temperatures, and they could be dangerous because Alaska is not used to high temperatures like these,” said Alekya Srinivasan, a Fairbanks-based meteorologist.
“We want to make sure that we have the correct wording and the correct communication when we’re telling people that it will be really hot this weekend,” she said.
But the change doesn’t reflect unprecedented temperatures, since Fairbanks had reached 32 C twice in 2024, Srinivasan said. It’s purely an administrative change by the weather service.
“It’s not that the heat in the interior that prompted Fairbanks to issue this is record heat or anything like that. It’s just now there’s a product to issue,” said Rich Thoman, a climate specialist at the Alaska Center for Climate Assessment and Policy.
No air-conditioning
Thoman also clarified that the term swap doesn’t have anything to do with climate change.
“I think some of it is related to the recognition that hot weather does have an impact on Alaska, and in the interior especially,” Thoman said.
While the temperatures in the forecast wouldn’t be considered extreme in other US states, Thoman noted that most Alaska buildings don’t have air-conditioning.
“And just the opposite, most buildings in Alaska are designed to retain heat for most of the year,” he said.
There’s only been two summers in Fairbanks in the 21st century with no hours of smoke that reduced visibility, a situation he said was commonplace from the 1950s to the 1970s.
The Juneau and Fairbanks weather service offices have been allowed to issue heat advisories beginning this summer, but not the office in the state’s largest city of Anchorage—at least not yet.
