Annual climate summary 2016: Central Alaska Network

Sousanes, Pamela; Hill, Ken

The Central Alaska Network’s climate monitoring program operates seventeen remote weather stations to monitor climate in Denali National Park and Preserve, Wrangell -St. Elias National Park and Preserve, and Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve. The main goal of the program is to maintain these remote sites for the long-term in order to help scientists and park managers understand the climate patterns across these large parks. There are weather stations around the parks that are operated by various state and federal agencies that are used as index sites to compare current climate conditions in the region to the climatological normal - the average weather conditions over a 30-year period. The current normal period is 1981-2010. This report presents annual and monthly temperature and precipitation deviations for the index sites and monthly and annual statistics for NPS sites with shorter records. A brief synopsis of regional, national, and global climate conditions for 2016 is included for climatic context. 2016 was the warmest year on record for Alaska. It was the third year in a row with record temperatures for Alaska. The mean annual temperatures at the CAKN index sites were, on average, 3.6°F (2.0°C) warmer than the 1981-2010 normal. Annual precipitation totals across the CAKN region varied from 78% of normal in Yakutat to 114% of normal in Eagle and Denali Park headquarters. During the summer of 2016, the Central Alaska Network staff conducted annual site maintenance at the thirteen CAKN climate stations, four snow telemetry sites, and assisted with maintenance of three fire weather stations. All of the 2016 CAKN RAWS weather data and corresponding metadata are available through the Integrated Resource Management Applications (IRMA) Data Store at https://irma.nps.gov/DataStore/Reference/Profile/2240059.

Annual climate summary 2016: Central Alaska Network

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