Falling into winter

The gorgeous fall colors -- yellow leaves, bright red berries and clear blue skies -- are about to give way to white snow and the familiar scenes of winter. Or at least that depends on who you ask.

After last winter, in which record highs were recorded and virtually no snow fell, gave way to a summer that was dry and hot, hot, hot, one would be inclined to think that the coming winter would be mild, too.

"That sounds like a good idea and a good way of thinking, but it doesn't work out that way," said John Stepetin, a National Weather Service specialist. "Last winter doesn't mean a lot about this winter."

So are we bound for a cold winter with lots of snow, or are we going to get rain and mild weather? Again, Stepetin said it all depends on who is right.

He and his National Weather Service colleagues think Southcentral Alaska is going to face a much harsher winter than the previous two winters, but the National Climate Research Center disagrees.

"Their long-lead observations indicate a 40-percent chance we'll have above-normal readings this winter in our area," Stepetin said Monday morning. "But we all have a hard time believing those numbers. I've been with the weather service for over 25 years, and I have a hard time believing that. They are always on the weak side with their Alaska long-range predictions."

Stepetin said he and his colleagues at the National Weather Service's Anchorage office think Southcentral Alaska residents should brace themselves for a colder winter than they've had the last two seasons.

"The thinking around here is that we'll probably have a pretty cold winter, hopefully with some good snow pack," Stepetin said. "We're hoping we get more to our average of 67 inches of snow, and hopefully even more than that. The previous two winters have been mild by our standards."

Stepetin said the beginning of last winter was more like a normal winter, but it didn't last.

"If you look at the whole winter, we had some extremes, and not much in the middle," Stepetin said. "In the first half, we got all our snow and the temperatures were about right. But after January, we were 19-20 inches below our normal snow levels and much warmer than normal."

There's already a nice cover of snow on Pioneer Peak and the Chugach Mountains, as well as some snow in the upper elevations up the Parks Highway. While temperatures continue to plummet, there is no forecast for snow in the next week, according to the National Weather Service.

There's a wind advisory for the Matanuska Valley for today, but temperature-wise, the highs are projected to between 40 and 50 degrees for the rest of the week.

During the evening, the temperatures are forecasted to dip into the mid-20s to mid-30s. It's supposed to be partly cloudy for the rest of the week, leading into a mostly cloudy weekend -- but there is no forecast for precipitation.

"Oh, man, winter will come soon enough," Stepetin said. "Don't worry about that. Winter will come."