Alaska Weather (Valdez, Seward, Cordova: growth, environmental, resources)

[LittleJazzyP]

Originally Posted by warptman

Cordova Snow Emergency - The Cordova Times

AK National Guard is going there to help out with the snow.

Good on them for establishing a shelter for the pets, too. I'm sure I'm not alone in saying if I was ever forced to evacuate, my first thought would be not for my safety, but for that of my animals.

Is there any need for donations of clothing, food (human and pet) or anything else?

[warptman]

Statement as of 11:15 AM AKST on January 09, 2012
Bethel and the Kuskokwim Delta
... Blizzard Warning remains in effect from 9 PM this evening to
9 am akst Tuesday...

A Blizzard Warning remains in effect from 9 PM this evening to
9 am akst Tuesday.

* Snow... up to 3 inches.

* Visibility... reduced to one quarter mile or less at times in
snow and blowing snow.

* Wind... north wind increasing to 25 to 40 mph.

* Timing... blizzard conditions will develop during the evening
as north winds begin to increase and then end Tuesday morning
as winds diminish.

* Impacts... snowfall combined with strong winds and blowing snow
will produce white-out conditions. Driving will be very
difficult.

Precautionary/preparedness actions...

A Blizzard Warning means severe winter weather conditions are
expected or occurring. Falling and blowing snow with strong winds
and poor visibilities are likely. This will lead to white-out
conditions... making travel very difficult. All travel and outdoor
activity is strongly discouraged.

[cjg5]

Hey Tigre and others, an interesting idea has come up in this thread on the weather forum:

Valdez, Alaska On Pace for Snowiest Season 2011-12

If you are running out of places to dump the snow, why not into the sea? That's just where all the melt runoff is gonna end up anyway, except for that by then it will be taking garbage and pollutants with it too. At least right now it's fresh.

[SityData]

Originally Posted by cjg5

Hey Tigre and others, an interesting idea has come up in this thread on the weather forum:

Valdez, Alaska On Pace for Snowiest Season 2011-12

If you are running out of places to dump the snow, why not into the sea? That's just where all the melt runoff is gonna end up anyway, except for that by then it will be taking garbage and pollutants with it too. At least right now it's fresh.

Them snow removal people in Valdez are the best in the world for what they do; no matter what the weather; They have been experts at doing this for many decades!! They get plenty of practice every single year and they have it all down PAT!

[cjg5]

Well then Valdez needs to issue help to Cordova.

Alaska Town Needs Help After Getting Snowed In - weather.com

[Wdexp]

As of 3:00 pm 3 degrees here in Anchorage, Alaska

[tigre79]

Originally Posted by cjg5

If you are running out of places to dump the snow, why not into the sea? That's just where all the melt runoff is gonna end up anyway, except for that by then it will be taking garbage and pollutants with it too. At least right now it's fresh.

There are environmental regulations concerning where you can put snow, but I'm really not totally familiar with all of that. There is stuff in there other than snow even when it's fairly "fresh," (mostly dog poo and the bits of trash that crows scatter about and are plowed up with the snow) and it's not as if there's some river of garbage flowing out of here in the spring or anything as it is. I do know that some snow is dumped into the bay, and have heard that Cordova has been doing that to an extent.

We're not running out of places to put snow, though, and I don't believe that's their issue either. The primary problem is having enough manpower to get it off of and away from buildings. That's why they needed the National Guard. They only have 2000 year-round residents, and a lot more buildings than a town that size would normally have because there are so many more people there in the summers for fishing. Adding to that, they're warmer than we are here so their snow is wetter and they got a bunch of rain on top of the 4 or 5 feet they got in that storm last week. That makes it much more difficult to deal with.

We're doing okay here, but also don't have a bunch of extra people hanging around that we could send elsewhere. We're looking at possibly getting rain after this next dump tomorrow, which will be a really ugly situation. In addition to generally cooler temperatures though, Valdez also has the advantage (odd thinking of it as that, because of the reason for it) of having been specifically designed, fairly recently, for mechanized snow removal. So it's a bit easier for us to deal with it than a town that's grown up organically over the last hundred years as a fishing and port town. And even so, we often have 6-12 inches of snow on the roads and sidewalks for a day or more at a time. The crews here are good, but definitely not perfect.

[AADAD]

Looks like some main roads are plowed.

Rain. That's another story altogether.

Seen grown men and women and their hands and knees trying to get to their cars.

Hope you have hockey gear!!

[warptman]

Join the Guard, see the world...and shovel snow in Cordova!

[artbrownsr]

Originally Posted by Minnesota Spring

So does the Eagle River area get more snow than Anchorage and Wasilla/Palmer usually?
Hopefully is is a wet heavy snow and not a dry light snow!

The wet heavy snow is harder to drive in harder to remove and in our accumulations could actually collapse roofs. The light snows even blow away as we drive up the hiways.