The following is a transcript from Rick Thoman’s weekly “Climate Highlight for Western Alaska” provided to KNOM Radio. Thoman is a Climate Specialist with the Alaska Center for Climate Assessment and Policy at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

February 24: Rick Thoman’s Climate Highlight for Western Alaska

NOAA's Climate Prediction Center has issued the outlook for March and for most of the area the outlook favors above normal temperatures for the month as a whole, as well as above normal precipitation.

One exception is for eastern Norton Sound coast and St Lawrence Island, where neither above or below normal temperatures are favored.

Since 2018 all but one March has seen significant storminess and much above normal precipitation. For reference, the long term normal temperature at Nome in March is just under 10 degrees, that's less than one degree higher than the February average, although March normals do start to climb late in the month.

Since 1907 temperatures in March have ranged from as high as 44 in 1938 down to 46 below in 1971. Normal snowfall is about 11 inches, and normal precipitation—that is the melted snow, plus any rain that occurs—is about three quarters of an inch.

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