Beat the heat

MAT-SU — After last year’s dreary summer, Valley residents will blissfully enjoy the recent warm weather no matter what the reason or record.

As a meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Anchorage, Andy Brown has to be a bit more specific.

“It really comes down to a big blocking ridge of high pressure,” Brown said.

Alaska sees this every couple of years, he said. A high-pressure system will sit over the state, creating a stagnant weather pattern. It gets warmer and warmer each day until the system starts to move on. The smoke from the wildfires in the Interior is trapped inside the system, causing the haze in the air.

While this may seem like the hottest beginning to a July on record, the temperatures in Wasilla and Palmer have failed to push the mercury to new heights. According to Weather.com, Thursday tied the record temperature in Wasilla, but the rest of the heat wave has been two to three degrees below the historical highs.

Brown said the system showed signs of moving Thursday. The temperatures will start dropping, but the sun should stay out through the weekend. Brown said we may start seeing some clouds and precipitation by the middle of next week.

That will make local firefighters happy.

Matt Weaver of the Division of Forestry said Thursday evening that there were 10 new fires across the state after Tuesday and five of those were in the Mat-Su Borough. All of them human caused. Three were burn piles at a time when burn permits are suspended. One was a burning car and the other started when a vehicle hit a utility pole and the transformer hit the ground and started a grass fire.

Weaver, talking from the huge fire near Nenana, said people need to call in to the division to make sure it is OK to burn before they strike a match.

Contact Todd L. Disher at todd.disher@frontiersman.com or 352-2252.