Category: Skywatch Almanac Weather | Fairbanks Museum & Planetarium's Blog

August Weather

Posted: August 5, 2019| Category: Skywatch Almanac Weather

Although the days are now noticeably shorter, it is encouraging that August is warmer than July, 4 out of 10 years. The combination of accumulating heat in the ground and the ocean forces the storm track to its most northerly point of the year, permitting lazy weather patterns to dominate… Read More

July Weather

Posted: July 10, 2019| Categories: Eye on the Sky, Skywatch Almanac Weather

With our weather’s reputation for such variety and changeability, it is hard to imagine there is a time that it ever quiets down. However, the heart of summer in July features some of our laziest weather patterns. But we are not alone in this situation, for the better part of… Read More

June Weather

Posted: June 3, 2019| Categories: Fairbanks Museum, Skywatch Almanac Weather

Summer emerges slowly but surely during the long days of June. Summer’s infancy might be like any new-born, full of delight and surprise, the new grass and leaves, giving a very different feel to any early heat wave that comes along. Rather than the stale, stifling heat of July or… Read More

May Weather

Posted: May 1, 2019| Categories: Eye on the Sky, Skywatch Almanac Weather

May’s beauty is more than just a poet’s notion. Apples and lilacs perfume the air, the trees and meadows display every shade of green possible, and the fresh blue skies are not yet spoiled with summer haze. The gardens are being planted, and the first fields are mown for hay. … Read More

Skywatch Weather

Posted: March 28, 2019| Category: Skywatch Almanac Weather

Two steps forward and one step back – such is April’s wayward course into spring. It is as though spring is still in its infancy, exploring the possibilities of warmer weather with some triumphant successes, but hampered by disappointing failures. The child-like fits and starts can be frustrating, or perhaps… Read More

Skywatch Weather

Posted: March 4, 2019| Category: Skywatch Almanac Weather

The fall of an empire has its share of cliches. So when winter’s reign comes to an end each March, the cliches begin dripping like the first strong run of sap. Winter appears invincible as the month begins. Snow depths are often at their maximum, the ice impenetrable, the boreal… Read More

February Weather

Posted: January 30, 2019| Category: Skywatch Almanac Weather

While there are signs hinting at Spring – longer, sunnier days, and warmer afternoons urging the first run of maple sap in the milder sugar woods – the weather does its best to disguise such phantoms of hope. Permitting a day or two of blue skies and light winds, the… Read More

January Weather

Posted: January 8, 2019| Categories: Eye on the Sky, Skywatch Almanac Weather

The month of January is named after the Roman god “Janus”, the two-faced deity, often associated with doors. Of course we could also apply this to January’s weather, which commands the coldest and snowiest weather most every winter. Yet within the month is winter’s contradiction, the January thaw. Though it… Read More

December Weather

Posted: December 4, 2018| Categories: Eye on the Sky, Skywatch Almanac Weather

More so than any other month during the winter, snow is welcomed by most in December. Perhaps it is because the cliché of a white Christmas is thrust upon us with every greeting card and every holiday advertisement. But I suspect there is more to it than that. Consider the… Read More

November Weather

Posted: November 2, 2018| Categories: Eye on the Sky, Skywatch Almanac Weather

November was known to the Anglo-Saxons as “winde monathe”, a tribute to the increase of storms this time of year. Lingering warmth in the southern states and in the oceans, represents a lot of energy and moisture. Should an early outbreak of cold collide with the warmth, then a major… Read More