Alaska Region Zone Changes
Effective April 5, 2022
Background
The National Weather Service (NWS) issues messages for geographical areas that Weather Forecast Offices (WFOs) pre-determine, called weather zones. These zones are located within each WFO's own unique area of responsibility called a County Warning Area (CWA).
One of the ways the National Weather Service disseminates information is by broadcasting official warnings, watches, forecasts and other hazard information 24 hours a day, seven days a week via the NOAA Weather Radio All Hazards (NWR) . This message alerting system functions based on areas defined by borough, census area, municipality, county and parish boundaries.
In hopes of providing quality public support, the Alaska NWS is working towards a goal of aligning weather zone boundaries with borough, municipality and census area boundaries, currently only along CWA borders. This initial effort will facilitate the reduction of over-alerting from one Weather Forecast Office’s CWA into another Weather Forecast Office’s CWA by alerting systems that define geographical areas in terms of boroughs, municipalities and census areas.
Below is an example showing the overlap of NWS weather zone 017, called “Cape Fairweather to Cape Suckling Coastal Area,” which is in WFO Juneau’s CWA, but currently extends into the Valdez-Cordova Census Area, which is primarily in WFO Anchorage’s CWA. This change will adjust the boundary of zone 017 such that it no longer overlaps into the Valdez-Cordova Census Area, served by WFO Anchorage.
Over-alerting Example: Valdez-Cordova Census Area
This phase of aligning all CWA boundaries with borough and census area boundaries will be implemented in April 2022.
Changes to Census Area
Effective January 02, 2019, the U.S. Census Bureau announced the deletion of the Valdez-Cordova Census Area, Alaska, FIPS code 02-261, and replacement with Chugach Census Area, FIPS code 02-063, and Copper River Census Area, FIPS code 02-066. The new census boundaries are displayed in the image below.
Zones Affected By Changes In Census Area
The map below displays the National Weather Service public forecast zones which overlap with the Copper River Census Area and the Chugach Census Area. The census area boundaries (white outline) are overlaid on the public zone boundaries (filled polygons).
Additional Zone Changes
The goal of these changes is to better align the Forecasting Offices' Areas of Responsibility with the Alaska borough/census area/municipality boundaries. All fire weather zones will coincide with public zone changes.
New Marine Zone For WFO Fairbanks
The map below shows the new marine zone for WFO Fairbanks effective April 05, 2022. The zone number will be 201 and the zone name will be "Etolin Strait To Dall Point". Key place names from the Service Change Notice (SCN) are labelled below.
Anchorage/Fairbanks
Region 1
The image above displays the results of the changes effective April 05, 2022. New WFO borders shown as yellow line (Left) are overlaid upon the current WFO borders shown as blue/black dashed line (Right). Notice the marine area gained by WFO Fairbanks as well as the change in WFO border boundaries.
Region 2
The image above displays the results of the changes effective April 05, 2022. New WFO borders shown as yellow line (Left) are overlaid upon the current WFO borders shown as blue/black dashed line (Right). Notice the shift in WFO border boundaries.
Region 3
The image above displays the results of the changes effective April 05, 2022. New WFO borders shown as yellow line (Left) are overlaid upon the current WFO borders shown as blue/black dashed line (Right). Notice the shift in WFO border boundaries.
Anchorage/Juneau
The image above displays the results of the changes effective April 05, 2022. New WFO borders shown as yellow line (Left) are overlaid upon the current WFO borders shown as blue/black dashed line (Right). Notice the shift in WFO border boundaries.
Mitigation
This change is part of a comprehensive plan to provide increased flexibility and improved accuracy of forecast, watch, warning, and advisory products in Alaska. Currently, changes are being made at a statewide level, but future plans include more localized changes. The NWS looks forward to continued work with partners to consider additional refinements within the CWAs.
