After a warm and sunny holiday weekend in the Upper Lynn Canal, the weather looks to be cooling down and clouding up for the rest of this week. KHNS’ Mike Swasey takes a closer look at the forecast with Wes Adkins from the National Weather Service in Juneau.
Swasey – After such a warm sunny weekend over the Fourth of July and even the end of last week, it was just incredible, we had all this great weather. What is the post-holiday week looking like?
Adkins – We’ve already seen some signs that the sunny skies are going by the wayside. We are expecting a little more cloud cover coming to the area here in mid-week. So definitely Wednesday into probably Friday, we are looking at mostly cloudy skies for Upper Lynn Canal, and some cooler temperatures so it’s not going to be quite as warm. We’re looking at highs in the 60s. We may have one or two days in the high 50s, but nothing too bad for this time of year.
We are looking at chances of rain in the forecast Wednesday into Friday. Probably the best chance of rain for Haines/Skagway region will be Thursday night into Friday morning at this point. So we are studying a more significant feature coming up but nothing too bad, just kind of some summer rainfall.
Swasey – What do you mean by a significant feature?
Adkins – When I say significant feature, I just mean a front that’ll bring some bonafide rain to us. So nothing too bad. This is our dry season still. Actually, we’re going into the wet season. I think August is one of the wettest months in Southeast Alaska.
Swasey – So what sort of chance of rain? You said Thursday into Friday, there’s a chance in the overnight maybe, but what sort of percentages are we looking at?
Adkins – Sure, so we’re looking at a 30 to 40% chance of rain on Wednesday. And then Thursday night we’re looking at chances of rain going probably up to 60%. Of course, these percentage chances will change as we gain confidence in events. That said looking into the weekend, we still have a chance of rain, or a slight chance of rain mentioned but there could be some signs that might be prettier than forecast. So we’ll have to keep an eye on that and I know a lot of weekenders up there will look forward to that.
Just a mention of the marine waters. We’re kind of in this diurnal cycle and diurnal is just a fancy word for like day/night. We’re just looking for winds going up to 20 knots in Taiya Inlet and maybe Lynn Canal in the afternoon and the evening and then kind of calming down. But generally southerly as we speak through the entire week.
Swasey – Okay, so nothing too substantial as far as the wind.
Adkins – Nothing too substantial, no.
Swasey – Alright, so it kind of just looks a little bit cloudy. Our sunburns will go away from this weekend.
Adkins – Yeah, get some good aloe, that always helps me.
Swasey – And then next weekend looks pretty nice. Wes, thanks so much. We’ll talk to you in a couple of weeks.
Adkins – Sounds great. Always a pleasure, Mike.
