A low pressure system in the Gulf of Alaska combined with a cold front moving east will bring snow, strong wind gusts and colder temperatures to the Interior this weekend.
The low pressure system in the gulf will bring approximately 2 to 3 inches of snow to Fairbanks early Saturday, Kaitlyn Lardeo with the National Weather Service said. The eastern-moving cold front will increase wind speeds with gusts of up to 20 to 30 miles per hour by Friday night.
Parts of Central Interior Alaska will be under a winter weather advisory from 3 a.m. to 7 p.m. Saturday, with some locations seeing the advisory run from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m. Saturday. Impacted areas include Fairbanks, North Pole, Eielson Air Force Base, Nenana, Healy, the Tanana Flats, Fort Yukon and portions of the Dalton Highway.
Eastern Interior Alaska will see a winter storm warning in effect from 8 p.m. Friday to midnight Saturday with 3 to 6 inches of snow possible. Impacted regions include the upper Chena, Salcha and Goodpaster rivers, Delta Junction, Tok, Tetlin, Fortymile country, the Yukon-Charley region and areas reaching to the Canada border. The weather service is predicting strong, windy conditions with blowing snow and cold wind chills on Saturday.
The combination of the two storms will create blowing snow and reduce visibility to a half mile or less. Travel could be difficult and roads will be slippery, Lardeo said. The cold front is expected to drop temperatures to more than 20 below zero on Saturday night and Sunday morning, she said.
"The dangerously cold wind chills — as low as 40 below zero — could cause frostbite on exposed skin in as little as 10 minutes," the National Weather Service reported in a winter weather advisory on Friday.
As of 4:30 p.m. Friday, the low Saturday night is a predicted 29 below zero, according to the latest weather service forecast.
Sunday and Monday will be dry with another storm bringing more snow Monday evening, Lardeo said.
The National Weather Service also advised that the storms may cause power outages in the Interior.
Contact Haley Lehman at 907-459-7575 or by email at hlehman@newsminer.com
