Record warmth and confused plants - an Alaska January to remember

[Blue_In_AK]

http://www.adn.com/2014/01/28/3296179/record-warmth-and-confused-plants.html

Warm weather blanketing Alaska for days now has shattered records, turned plants green and changed the way some people live.

The temperature hit 62 degrees at Port Alsworth, on Lake Clark, on Monday, tying the highest January temperature ever recorded in the state, the National Weather Service reported.

Nome peaked at 51 degrees, topping the city's warmest January with a temperature typical of early June, forecasters said.

In Anchorage, snow continued melting Tuesday in the latest of 15 consecutive days with temperatures at 32 degrees or above. As of Monday, it was the city's fourth warmest January ever recorded.

"It's spectacular," said Sam Albanese, warning coordination meteorologist with the weather service.

While Alaska is prone to warm spells occasionally breaking up winter freeze, the string of unseasonably warm days rarely last for this long, he said.

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(Not my photo but taken near where I live.)