Hot enough for ya?
If you answered yes, that wouldn’t be surprising.
A good chunk of the Northwest, in the Yukon and the Northwest Territories, are sizzling this week as a heatwave bears down.
Inuvik in the Beaufort Delta led the way on Wednesday. The town along the east channel of the Mackenzie River blew up its record temperature by almost five degrees, topping out at a baking 34.8 degrees Celsius.
According to Lisa Irvin, a meteorologist with Environment Canada, the old record of 30 degrees had been set in 1994.
Meanwhile, both Faro and Beaver Creek set records as well Wednesday, although not in such a drastic and dramatic manner.
Faro topped out at 29.8 degrees, with the previous record being 29.7 degrees in 1994.
Beaver Creek was more significant, coming in at 30.3 degrees. The previous mark was 29 degrees, also set in 1994.
Irvin told The Yukon Star this morning the heat wave, which is somewhat late by northern standards, is due to a strong ridge of high pressure hovering over an area ranging from northern British Columbia through the Yukon and Northwest Territories.
She said it’s not just the high daytime temperatures responsible for the agency issuing a heat warning this week. The nighttime temperatures are higher than normal as well, hovering in the two-digit range where they should be falling below 10 degrees, now that true night is slowly returning to the higher latitudes.
At 6:00 this morning, Environment Canada reported the temperature at the Erik Nielsen Whitehorse International Airport as 14. That’s unusually warm for this time of year.
Yesterday, the temperature in Whitehorse maxed out at 28 degrees. Normal temperatures are 19 degrees for a high, with lows of seven degrees.
Mike Smith, the official meteorologist for the Yukon, agreed with Irvin’s points.
He said the current high pressure ridge is similar to the infamous “heat domes” that have baked parts of North America in the past few years, including Lytton, B.C., where the town burned to the ground.
“The longer these last, the temperature goes up by about a degree or two a day,” Smith told the Star this morning.
At one time, it was unusual to have these kinds of temperatures in the Yukon at this time of year, but it’s happening more and more frequently over approximately the last decade.
The change is likely due to a combination of climate change and random variability, Smith said.
He’s noticed the nighttime temperatures this year seem to be warmer than normal, although he hasn’t run the numbers on that yet.
Such seemingly minor changes contribute to the increase in average temperatures.
That could also be a sign of climate change, but it’s difficult to pin that down.
