Alaska Extended Forecast Discussion
National Weather Service College Park MD
744 PM EDT Sat Sep 20 2025
Valid 12Z Wed 24 Sep 2025 - 12Z Sun 28 Sep 2025
***Rain and wind for southern Alaska for the end of the week***
...General Overview...
A well-developed occluded surface low over the Bering Sea rapidly
tracks east through Thursday, with a secondary low forming after
crossing the Alaska Peninsula and becoming the dominant low over
the Gulf for the end of the week. Meanwhile, an amplifying trough
over eastern Siberia should support a developing surface low near
the Bering Strait, and thus a cold front that could approach
western Alaska by next Saturday.
...Guidance Evaluation/Preferences...
The 12Z model guidance suite featured good overall synoptic scale
agreement for Wednesday, and therefore a multi-deterministic
model blend works well as a starting point in the forecast process.
Looking ahead to the end of the week, the GFS becomes faster and
much stronger with the eastern Siberia low and dives southward to
the Gulf, whereas the CMC/ECMWF maintain a better clustered low
solution near northwest mainland Alaska by next Saturday, which
could result in even colder conditions and wintry precipitation
going into next weekend across the western half of the state, so
this will be something to monitor going forward. The ensemble
means were gradually increased to about 60% by the end of the
forecast period owing to high uncertainty across domain.
...Weather/Hazards Highlights...
The next low pressure system will bring potential for hazardous
weather for southern coastal areas of Alaska towards the middle to
end of next week. High winds are expected along the Aleutians
Tuesday through Wednesday as the system strengthens over the
Bering Sea. The low could bring localized heavy rain to South-
Central and Southeast Alaska on Thursday into Friday. In terms
of temperatures, colder conditions will be commonplace across most
of the mainland, with subfreezing overnight lows becoming more
widespread across the Interior by the middle of next week. There
may be a renewed surge of colder conditions by next Saturday over
northwestern Alaska depending on how the low near eastern Siberia
evolves, and changes to the forecast are likely.
Hamrick
Additional 3-7 Day Hazard Information can be found on the WPC
medium range hazards outlook chart at:
https://www.wpc.ncep.noaa.gov/threats/threats.php
WPC medium range Alaskan products including 500mb, surface
fronts/pressures progs and sensible weather grids can also be
found at:
https://www.wpc.ncep.noaa.gov/alaska/ak_5dayfcst500_wbg.gif
https://www.wpc.ncep.noaa.gov/alaska/akmedr.shtml
https://www.wpc.ncep.noaa.gov/alaska/ak_5km_gridsbody.html