Temperatures in the area were unseasonably high last week, reaching into the mid-40s, according to the National Weather Service. Then temperatures dropped below freezing Sunday and into Monday morning. "There's a lot of water flowing underground in this area," McCarthy said. The freeze-thaw "caused some instability and that made it slide."
Near record stretch of foggy days at Ted Stevens International Airport.
One important factor is the depth of the lake. But there are other variables too.
Alaska Division of Forestry spokesman Norm McDonald said the 2-acre fire's exact cause has not been determined but is suspected to be similar to that of four smaller Mat-Su wildfires earlier Thursday. Those blazes were tracked to backfires from a white Chevrolet pickup truck.
A recent study estimates permafrost coverage on the peninsula has decreased by 60 percent since 1950. Permafrost is usually associated with Northern and Interior Alaska, but it also occurs in isolated pockets in wetlands on the Kenai Peninsula.
Early hay crop harvest
Sockeye wildfire at mile post 77 of the George Parks Highway near Willow.
3/24/15 Early golfing - Palmer, Alaska, USa
9-21-12 Extreme rain and flooding - Wasilla, Alaska, USA
“This has been a very trying time,” mother Tanisha Charles said. “You don’t prepare for this. You think of fires, you think of earthquakes, but you never think of a mudslide in the middle of town.”
The European black slug was first introduced into Alaska in the 1980s in Cordova, Slowik said. It eventually made its way to Juneau and Ketchikan, likely hitching a ride on fishing gear, and is now prevalent across Southeast. A few years ago, people started seeing the slug in Whittier and Girdwood.
The Northway Mall in northeast Anchorage sits almost totally empty. That’s led to people dumping loads of trash, furniture, appliances and industrial waste all over the property.
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