By Don Quilici
This is almost a repeat of a story written back in November but with a different twist and some additional details.
Enjoy: Late January is a very special time of the year in the lives of about four thousand, hardy Alaskans.
They live in Barrow, Alaska, the northernmost community in the U.S.
It is located in the Far North, on the edge of the Arctic Ocean, 320 miles north of the Arctic Circle, 725 airline miles north of Anchorage and 1,122 miles from the North Pole.
On January 24, weather permitting, the sun will peek over the horizon at Barrow for the first time since back on November 18 last year.
That’s more than two months without any sunshine!
And, once the sun rises, it continues to rise more and more every day until May 13, when it is in the sky, 24 hours a day for 82 days.
Wow! Talk about long winter nights and long summer days!
In Barrow, when the sun is either rising or setting, it does so at the rate of about 15 minutes per day!
Here is a whole bunch of interesting information about Barrow with much of it courtesy of Wikipedia.com. (Though you’re not going to be able to access the site on Wednesday, Jan. 18. Wikipedia is protesting, along with other websites, the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act (PIPA) legislation pending in Congress.)
Barrow, Alaska:
It is the borough seat of the North Slope Borough in Alaska, and it is one of the northernmost cities in the world with nearby Point Barrow being the nation’s northernmost land point.
Barrow derives its name from Point Barrow, which was named by Fredrick William Beechey in 1825 for Sir John Barrow of the British Admiralty.
That location has been home to native Inupiat Eskimo for over 1,000 years, under the name of “Ukpeagvik,” which translates into:
“The place where Snow Owls are hunted.”
According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 21 square miles, 18 square miles of which is land and 3 square miles of water.
The city’s official population was 4,683 in the 2000 census of which approximately 61% were Iñupiat Eskimo.”
Barrow is surrounded by the National Petroleum Reserve – Alaska.
Alaska Airlines provides the only year-round access to Barrow from either Anchorage and Fairbanks.
No roads connect the city to the rest of Alaska. Its city streets are unpaved.
The predominant land type in Barrow is Tundra, which sits on Permafrost that is as much as 1,300 feet in depth. That’s 1,300 feet of ice!
Many residents rely upon subsistence food sources such as: whale, seal, polar bear, walrus, waterfowl and caribou.
Climate and weather:
Owing to its location, Barrow’s climate is cold and dry and is classified as a polar climate. Winter can be extremely dangerous because of a combination of cold and wind, while summers are cool even at their warmest.
Despite the extreme northern location, temperatures at Barrow are moderated by the surrounding topography.
With the Arctic Ocean on three sides, and flat tundra stretching some 200 miles to the south, there are no wind barriers and there are no protected valleys where dense cold air can settle or form temperature inversion in the lower atmosphere in the way that commonly happens in the Interior between the Brooks Range and the Alaska Range.
Barrow experiences the lowest average temperatures in Alaska.
Temperatures remain below freezing from early October through late May.
The high temperature is above freezing an average of 109 days per year. There are freezing minimum temperatures an average of 324 days per year.
Wow, if you turn that around, there are only 41 days a year without freezing!
Barrow is a desert, with an average of less than 5 inches “equivalent rainfall” per year, which includes less than 30 inches of snow.
In addition to the low temperatures and months without sun, Barrow is also one of the cloudiest places on earth. Owing to the prevailing easterly winds off the Arctic Ocean, Barrow is completely overcast slightly more than 50% of the year and at least 70% overcast, 62% of the time.
Dense fog occurs an average of 65 days per year, mostly in the summer months. Ice fog is very common during the winter months, especially when the temperature drops below −30 F degrees.
Serious cold weather usually begins in January with average high is -8 F and average low is -20 F.
February is generally the coldest month, averaging −16 F.
By March 1 the sun is up for 9 hours, the average temperature is 2 or 3 degrees warmer, and the winds are usually higher.
April brings less extreme temperatures, with an average of about 0 F, but on April 1 there are over 14 hours of sunlight.
In May the temperatures are much warmer, averaging 20 F.
Beginning in May, the phenomenon known as the midnight sun occurs and the sun does not set for 82–83 days, until July 31-August 1.
In June the average temperature rises above freezing, to 35 F, and average daily temperatures remain above freezing until mid-September.
July is the warmest month of the year with an average high of 46 F and an average low temperature of 34 F.
Beginning in late July the Arctic Ocean is relatively ice-free, and remains so until late October.
Finally:
Now that you know all of that information about Barrow, Alaska, aren’t you glad that you live in Carson City, Nevada, where we see sunshine about 300 days per year and our coldest temperature ever was only -22 F.
Bet Your Favorite Pigeon
Bet your favorite pigeon that he can’t tell you about the coldest temperature ever recorded in Barrow for the months of Jan-Feb-Mar-Apr-May.
If he grins takes a deep breath and says, “The record lows are:
Jan: -57 F degrees, Feb: -58 F, Mar: -53 F, Apr: – 42 F and May: -19,” he could be a former resident of Barrow.
— Writer Don Quilici lives in Carson City and is the Outdoor editor for Carson Now and South Tahoe Now. He can be reached at donquilici@hotmail.com
