Anchorage ties its wettest July on record as Southcentral soaks

Anchorage Airport recorded 4.49 inches of rain last month, tying 2001 for the wettest July since records began in 1952. Talkeetna measured 10.59 inches, its wettest July since 1922. Much of Southcentral took in two to three times its normal rainfall, according to the monthly climate summary from Alaska climate specialist Rick Thoman.

It was also a cool month nearly everywhere in the state. Anchorage had its coolest July since 2008, Fairbanks its coolest since 2001.

What set the month apart was persistence, not any one storm. Anchorage saw measurable rain on 12 straight days, its longest such summer streak since 1981, most of it in a wet stretch in mid-July after a dry June. Two storms between July 20 and 23 capped the rain in the lower Susitna Valley and caused localized flooding. The Talkeetna River crested just above flood stage, its highest since 2012, and a landslide north of Talkeetna shut down Alaska Railroad service between Denali National Park and Talkeetna until crews cleared it.

Alaska News has tracked this pattern as it unfolded, from the cool, wet trough that parked over the state in July to the flood watches that followed as an atmospheric river moved in. Every month from December 2025 through June 2026 ran below the long-term baseline statewide, and the wet July fits the same cold, wet run.

This July also belongs to a recent cluster of unusually wet ones, though the cause isn't settled. Four of the eight Anchorage Julys with more than four inches of rain have come since 2022, against a long-term median around 1.7 inches. The wet pattern wasn't statewide, though; Southeast Alaska ran below normal under the same setup.

More rain was in the forecast for early August, with the National Weather Service issuing a flood watch for the Lower Matanuska and Susitna valleys and 3 to 5 inches forecast in the upper Yentna, Chulitna and Susitna basins.