The National Weather Service issued its first-ever heat advisory for Alaska last week. The alert was for the northern Interior, where temperatures climbed into the mid-80s over the weekend — and they’re expected to stay there until next week.
Alaska has seen temperatures in the 80s and above before, but this is the first time the weather service has used its newly granted authority to issue heat advisories in Alaska to tell the public to avoid the outdoors.
Unlike extreme cold, it’s not easy for people in the region to manage unusually hot weather. But Fairbanksans are coming up with creative ways to cool off — and to cool off their many dogs.
At the Fairbanks Animal Shelter on Monday, a 7-year-old lab mix named Olive was splashing around in a kiddie pool. The aging shelter’s kennels can get uncomfortably stuffy with hotter weather, so caretakers like Britley Calkins are trying out a bunch of things to keep the dogs cool and happy — from sprinklers to pools to “pup-cicles.”
“We've got frozen Kongs,” she said. “Peanut butter and cheese frozen on Frisbees that can hang on the outside of their kennels to lick off. They’re all great ways to keep them enriched while they're here at the shelter, but also give them something that can kind of cool them off as well.”
Humans in Fairbanks are having a hard time of it, too. The buildings here are generally designed to retain heat, and very few homes are air conditioned. People can get some relief by cracking doors and windows, but right now that’s officially discouraged because of wildfire smoke that’s blown over from Canada.
Dakota Brickley, who works the front desk of the Fairbanks Ice Museum, said a crowd of people came in to ask if they could take refuge.
“I recommended they would need a jacket, and they said, ‘No, we actually want it to be cold. We're, like, roasting outside,’” Brickley said.
Heat advisories are meant to warn the public about hazardous periods of hot weather. On June 1, the weather service gave Alaska offices in Juneau and Fairbanks permission to issue heat advisories for the first time ever. Before that, Alaska offices communicated heat information exclusively through special weather announcements.
And meteorologists say heat advisories like these could become more and more common — Alaska is warming two to three times faster than the global average, and the mean summer temperatures in the Interior are climbing.
Ciara Santiago, a meteorologist with the weather service in Fairbanks, said the current high temperatures could hang around for a while.
“Especially coupled with how much sunshine we have right now, as we approach the summer solstice,” she said. “Any kind of elevated temperatures that we have during the day are going to last for a long time. Those temperatures can bleed into how it feels inside the house or inside buildings.”
Santiago also says it's really important that people in the region take breaks, find shade, and stay hydrated. People should also monitor young children and pets and never leave them in unattended vehicles, which can reach extreme temperatures in as little as 10 minutes.