ANCHORAGE, Alaska—
The National Weather Service issued a high wind warning for Anchorage and Turnagain Arm, with gusts of up to 90 mph projected this week as a major low-pressure system approaches Western Alaska.According to the warning, in effect from 4 p.m. Tuesday to 1 a.m. Wednesday for Anchorage, Eagle River and Indian, parts of east Anchorage and the lower Hillside may see southeast winds of 25 to 40 mph with gusts up to 60 mph. Areas of Turnagain Arm and the upper Hillside may see winds at 50 to 70 mph with gusts to 90 mph, possibly making travel difficult or blowing around debris.
Channel 2 meteorologist Mitch Sego says the winds are a product of two storm systems, one of which is leaving the area and another which is approaching from the Pacific Ocean.
"This is another big storm system, a line of them that is coming from the west, a very winter-like pattern, and we're getting an early start apparently this year," Sego said.
According to Sego, while the system is forecasted to travel north along the state's west coast, its worst effects will occur over land with some of the storm's energy channeled through terrain in southern Alaska.
"It's to the east of this, out ahead of the center of this low where the rain, some of the heaviest rain, and where definitely some of the nastiest winds will be," he said.
Sego described the approaching low-pressure system as "an unseasonably deep storm system," saying it was likely to register barometric drops similar to both last winter's Bering Sea storm and Hurricane Isaac, which battered the southern U.S. last week.
He credited a high-pressure ridge ahead of the system over the Pacific Ocean as a factor in the potential strength of the storm.
