January was unusually mild almost everywhere in Alaska and the Bering Strait region was no exception. There was a lot of rain and snow, especially from Nome eastward. The snowdrop finally ended the second week of the month.
The average temperature in January at Nome airport was 14 and a half degrees, that's about nine degrees above normal. While that's not close to a record, this was the mildest January since 2016.
During the month, temperatures at Nome ranged from 36 on the 18th to 26 below on the 29th and 30th. Precipitation, that is the melted water equivalent of the snow plus the rain that fell totaled 2.36 inches. That's more than double normal and the fifth highest for any January in the past 119 years.
The windiest weather of the month came early with three straight days with peak winds over 50 miles an hour. However, this was a dry northeast wind that occurred when there was hardly any snow on the ground and temperatures were above normal, so the wind chills were not extreme.
