Title: Climate change is already affecting Alaska’s weather.
Headings: Baked Alaska
Baked Alaska
“What’s living in Alaska if it’s not cold and snowy?”

Content: Then, about two years ago, something in the climate system switched. The state’s recent brush with extreme weather is more than just year-to-year weather variability. Alaska is at the point where the long-term trend of warming has begun to trump seasonal weather fluctuations. A recent shift toward warmer offshore ocean temperatures is essentially adding more fuel to the fire, moving the state toward more profound tipping points like the irreversible loss of permafrost and increasingly violent weather. If the current warm ocean phase (which began in 2014) holds for a decade or so, as is typical, Alaska will quickly become a different place. Oblique aerial photographs show changes in the terminus of Bear Glacier, Kenai Mountains, Kenai Fjords National Park, Alaska, during the five-year period between 2002 and 2007. Photos courtesy of USGS
The Pacific Ocean near Alaska has been record-warm for months now. This year is off to a record-wet start in Juneau. Kodiak has recorded its warmest winter on record. A sudden burst of ocean warmth has affected statewide weather before, but this time feels different, residents say.