Climate Watch

By Rick Thoman Alaska Climate Specialist Alaska Center for Climate Assessment and Policy International Arctic Research Center/University of Alaska Fairbanks

It’s time for the Climate Watch annual year-in-review, and 2022 was certainly an eventful year weather and climate-wise for Nome and all of western Alaska. Of course, ex-typhoon Merbok in September tops the list in terms of impacts, and recovery from the storm is going to take, in some cases, years.

2022 by the numbers at Nome

Average temperature: 30°F, which was 2°F above 1991-2020 normal but 4.5°F above the 1951-80 normal. Overall, this was the 11th warmest year in the past 115 years. January was the only month that was significantly colder than normal, while March plus April was the eighth warmest on record. The highest temperature of the year was 73°F on June 5, 6, 7 and 30, and the lowest was -25°F on February 10.

Total precipitation (rain plus melted snow) was 21.93 inches, compared to a normal 17.22 inches. Six days set or tied record high temperatures, no days set or tied record low temperatures and six days set or tied highest precipitation records.

The year was unusually windy: the average wind speed of 10.3 mph was the third highest since 1999 (the first full year of the automated weather observation system). There were also 11 days in the year with an average wind speed of 25 mph or more, which appears to be the most days that windy in at least the past 50 years.

Notable Weather Events

January 9: Extreme winds at Golovin with the 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. average wind speed 53 mph and peak wind of 76 mph.

February 1-3: Extreme winds in much of the region except Bering Strait and St Lawrence Island. At Unalakleet, the average three-day wind speed was 45 mph with a peak wind of 74 mph. At Nome, both February 2 and 3 had an average wind speed over 30 mph. Schools at Unalakleet and Nome were closed and by the afternoon of February 3 many Nome businesses shut down due to the threat of blowing debris. There was some roof damage at Nome.

March 18: Very strong north winds and a ground blizzard in the Topkok Hills forced six Iditarod mushers to scratch from the Iditarod.

April 30: Temperature at Nome reached 53°F, the highest April temperature since 1940.

May 9: Shorefast ice moved out and water on the beach at Nome

May 21: Nome low temperature was only 49°F. This is the warmest low temperature so early in the season. Previous record for earliest date with a low temperature of 49°F or higher was May 25, 1969.

front July pushed 1: An dense approaching smoke from weather large wildfires north of Iliamna Lake across western Alaska, with many areas having 6 to 12 hours of hazardous air quality. At Nome it was the worst wildfire smoke since summer

1977.

July 18-19: A cold airmass al- lowed snow to fall right down to sea level in the Bering Strait and there was a dusting of snow on the hills north of Nome.

August 8-25: Sea ice from the north Chukotka coast drifted southeast into the Bering Sea in an unusually strong and persistent East Siberian coastal current. Ice was visible a few days from Little Diomede. September 16-17: Ex-typhoon Merbok hit western Alaska and caused the highest ocean water level in Nome since November 1974. Apparently, this storm brought the highest water level at Golovin in the past century and there was damage to the protective berm at Shaktoolik. The average wind speed at Nome on September 16 of 34.5 mph is the third highest daily average in the past 50 years. Peak wind was 59 mph.

November 27: First sea ice at Nome moves in from the east.

December 1-2: Over half an inch of freezing rain at Nome. Rain and sustained above freezing temperatures melted off most of all of the thin snow cover at Savoonga and Teller and created very icy conditions in many areas.

Solstice and Christmas: Open water in front of Nome as strong northeast winds blew out thin sea ice that had formed nearshore. Also on Christmas, the ocean water briefly levels bottom out at 7 feet below the low tide line, apparently the lowest level since the NOAA tide gauge was installed in the 1980s.