Has there been more rain this summer??

[baxley]

I've been watching the Juneau harbor cam...and it seems that it is raining every day! Has this Summer been wetter than normal? And will it continue?? Thanks.

[donaldsc]

I've been watching the Juneau harbor cam...and it seems that it is raining every day! Has this Summer been wetter than normal? And will it continue?? Thanks.

 

As far as the amount of rain, there are lots of weather sites on the WEB. You can go on them and see home much rain has fallen as compared to the average. As far as "will it continue", it is Alaska. Who knows.

 

DON

[MalRC]

I've been watching the Juneau harbor cam...and it seems that it is raining every day! Has this Summer been wetter than normal? And will it continue?? Thanks.

 

The first two weeks in July were dry, then apparently the skies opened up.

 

Arrived in Anchorage on July 3, 3am it was raining. Woke up about 10am, it had stopped raining. We spent a day in Anchorage, no rain, 4 days in Denali and it spritzed for 5 minutes. We then got on Radiance and saw a little bit of rain as we were leaving Skagway. It was dry the rest of the time.

 

I read that Denali had something like 16 inches of rain in July and had a landslide on the park road. It was dry and wonderful when we were there.

[cowbana]

We were on the July 29 sailing of Celebrity Solstice, with ports of Ketchikan, Juneau, and Skagway. We did not have any rain at all, even though some earlier web forecasts called for decent chances. Guess it's really unpredictable.

[farmgirl65]

We were in Juneau on August 3 . Had a wee bit of rain when we got off the ship around noon. Not a problem at all. The rest of our cruise was dry and pleasant.

 

 

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[lmintzer]

I was on the July 24 sailing of the Pearl. We had rain in Juneau and rain in Skagway (drizzle plus very low cloud cover). Enough so that all flightseeing was cancelled for the day. Glacier Bay day started out very overcast and cloudy. Finally, for the last hour, the skies lightened up. It was still quite beauttiful. Ironically, we had sunny, warm weather in Ketchikan. Go figure.

[sunnygrannyd]

On Aug 5 sailing of Celebrity Solstice we had rain all day in Juneau and some tours were cancelled. Also ship could not go into Tracy Arm due to ice. We had a rare sunny warm day in Ketchikan and a very cool dry day in Skagway.

[mondello]

Right by the pier in Ketchikan is a sign and rain gauge displaying how much rain they get there every year and it was just an unbelievable amount of rain and it wasn't quite mid-July. Now I can't even remember if I saw that in Juneau or Ketchikan?

 

We were there July 5-12 and had pretty good weather overall. A good rain jacket is needed regardless. Our rain shells were invaluable against the really strong winds on the small boat excursion in Endicott Bay. Pack layers and you'll be fine.

 

We paid more, hoping for good weather in July. Sure the rain can make for a miserable day but if you are dressed properly for the the weather you can still have fun.

[zqvol]

We were in AK from July 15th through the 29th. It rained on 12 of those days. The people in Denali said that it had rained 35 of the previous 40 days. Just something to consider.

[Chicogirl]

We were there on 7-18 and it was very hot at 87 that day. Not a rain cloud in site.

[Coral]

We paid more, hoping for good weather in July. Sure the rain can make for a miserable day but if you are dressed properly for the the weather you can still have fun.

 

May and June are usually dryer than the rest of the summer. You didn't need to pay more for July to have dryer weather. July is expensive because it is the most popular vacation month.

[Cuervosar]

Yes and no.

[gpb11]

Right by the pier in Ketchikan is a sign and rain gauge displaying how much rain they get there every year and it was just an unbelievable amount of rain and it wasn't quite mid-July. Now I can't even remember if I saw that in Juneau or Ketchikan?

 

That would be Ketchikan. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketchikan,_Alaska

 

Average of over 150 inches precipitation per year.

 

Southeast Alaska is a temperate rainforest. It has that climate designation for a reason.

 

(from http://www.pitt.edu/~mabbott1/climate/mark/Images/Thumbnails_of_Alaska_images/thumbnails_alaska_images.html )

Edited August 15, 2016 by gpb11

[Sequim88]

Just a gut feeling observation from farther south (Seattle area) but the typical annual patterns seem s to be about 3-4 weeks behind "schedule". The AK panhandle area has been plagued with a stream of low pressure areas that park in the Gulf of Alaska and swing fronts into the coast.

 

But signs are that the high pressure ridge that sits over BC and produces off-shore flow is finally setting up - as witnessed the past couple weeks in Seattle. Off-shore flows (down slope from the mountains) make for warmer air as well as drier air. No guaranties but the 96 hour forecast at the moment is showing the ridge in place for the panhandle. If it holds it can stay that way for several weeks.

 

Forecast maps at: OPC