Iditarod moved further north in Alaska due to lack of snow this winter

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/iditarod-moved-further-north-in-alaska-due-to-lack-of-snow-this-winter-1.2984090

Much of the start of the world's most famous sled dog race is covered in barren gravel, forcing Iditarod organizers to move the start further north where there is snow and ice.

A weather pattern that buried the eastern U.S. in snow has left Alaska fairly warm and relatively snow-free this winter, especially south of the Alaska Range.

"If I have one more person say to me to move the Iditarod to Boston, I'm going to shake my head," said race director Mark Nordman.

The Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race starts Saturday with a ceremonial run through Anchorage. But the official start two days later has been moved 362 kilometres north, over the Alaska Range, to Fairbanks to avoid the area that left many mushers bruised and bloodied last year. Iditarod officials said the conditions are worse this year.

The race's chief executive officer, Stan Hooley, called the conditions "pretty miserable." And last year was no picnic.

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Alaskans can thank the jet stream, which has been delivering warm air from the Pacific, said Dave Snider, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Anchorage.

"That position of the jet has been pretty stagnant, or at least in the general same position for a long period of time. While that's allowing a lot of cold air to flow out of the Arctic into the Midwest and the eastern seaboard, we're locked into the warmer part of that pattern, and we've continued to see those warm pushes for a fairly long period over the winter," he said.

Anchorage gets about 152 centimetres of snow in a normal year; this year only about 50 centimetres have fallen.

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