The national Weather Service’s Fairbanks bureau has changed lines of its forecast zones in northern Alaska in order to offer more precise forecasts for weather and advisories.
“Our warnings and advisories, as well as watches and warnings will be targeted to sort of match the local area and are therefore more representative of the actual conditions we’re experiencing,” said Ryan Metzger an meteorologist from the Weather Service’s Fairbanks office in charge of the revamp of the forecast zone.
Metzger said that the Fairbanks office released the updated edition of their online maps for the first time this week.
“We’ve implemented them but are but we’re still working on bugs that are still lingering,” he said Wednesday.
The map online shows small and reconfigured forecast zones which better take into account factors like elevation and the historical patterns of weather. For instance, instead of one huge zone that covered the majority areas of Fairbanks North Star Borough, there are now six zones.
“So the old forecast zone which included Fairbanks also contained lots of high terrain, like or along on the Steese Highway,” he explained. “And thanks to the new forecast that we now have, we can send out a warning for the higher terrain which could be prone to a lot of snow. But we may also take out Fairbanks if they’re likely to be getting the same amount.”
Metzger said that the reconfigured zones will be helpful for better forecasting and advisory notices on the conditions in higher elevation areas outlying like those around Denali National Park and Preserve.
“We have divided Denali Borough into two zones,” he said. Denali Borough into two different forecast zones,” he said. “The line of separation for this is right at the park’s entrance.”
He explained that this will allow the forecaster to produce forecasts that take into account the possibility of snow in the southern part of the zone in the event that a winter storm is moving towards that direction. Also, to take into account an increased chance of strong wind gusts in northern zones. The new zones for areas of mountainous terrain that lie along Richardson Highway will function similar to.
“Same same thing happens the south side of Delta Junction, through Isabel Pass there,” he said.
Metzger said that forecasts and advisories will help determine the higher chance of snow and rain within the zone which extends southern part of Trims Camp, about 20 miles to the north of Trims Camp. They’ll also track stronger northwest winds up to Black Rapids and on to Delta.
“So it is helpful to break things down in winter storms.” Metzger said other new forecast zones are also designed to separate St. Lawrence Island, located in the Bering Sea and the western coastline of Alaska. There are also new zones in the vicinity of Anchorage.
“Their modifications were comparatively small, compared to what we were doing at the Interior,” he said.
The updated forecast zone maps are available via the NWS’s Fairbanks web site.
