Winter Storm — City and Borough of Yakutat, Alaska

2026-01-04 to 2026-01-05 · City and Borough of Yakutat, Alaska

Event narrative

Light snow began to fall in the Yakutat area during the evening of the 4th with rates picking up after midnight. Visibility fell to a quarter mile at times through the morning of the 5th with sustained E-NE winds increasing to 20mph. An NWS Employee measured 9.2 inches of snow at 920am and another 2.6 inches 4 hours later. As temperatures steadily rose through the day, a period of freezing rain was observed at the airport in the evening followed by a wind shift to the SW and a change to rain for a short period of time.

Wider weather episode

Temperatures cooled across SE Alaska along with outflow winds during the first couple days of January after December's big snow dump. This allowed the next system that moved in from the west on the 4th and 5th to start out as snow. Prefrontal snow showers during the evening of the 4th added to the storm total snow for parts of the northern and central panhandle, then the main system moved in overnight with heavy snow on Monday the 5th (set to be the first day back at school after Winter Break for most locations). The southern panhandle saw a change over to rain during the day on the 5th, then the rain/snow line pushed northward through the night and into the morning of the 6th. Some strong winds accompanied the front, starting out of the north then shifting to the south with the front and causing temperatures to rise.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1315952. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.