Deciphering the many facets of weather

Two young adults smile in front of a photoshopped background of a road leading to Denali.

“Come here and find out that million-acre years are pretty common and they’re dealt as extreme years, but in more recent years, you wind up seeing more and more million acres burned.” -Jacob Coffey

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Alaska Weather Voices – Episode 2: Career

A young Rick Thoman smiles at the camera in an older, grainy photo on of a rocky beach. Small ice bergs float in the water behind him.

This podcast miniseries focuses on the life and career of Alaska Center for Climate Assessment and Policy (ACCAP)’s climate specialist, Rick Thoman. This podcast, hosted by Liz Carter, is made by ACCAP in partnership with Alaska Voices. In this episode Rick Thoman outlines the bulk of his career thus far, covering his time at the National Weather Service in Nome and Fairbanks as well as his transition to working for ACCAP in 2018. The episode delves in on defining moments that set the trajectory for his career and approach working with Alaska communications.

“Nome was my very first lesson in listening to what’s important to people as far as weather and climate impacts and the kinds of information that they need.” –Rick Thoman

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Alaska Weather Voices – Episode 1: Origins

A young Rick Thoman in a red sweater and large afro hair style smiles into the camera in a high school photo style potrait.

This podcast miniseries focuses on the life and career of Alaska Center for Climate Assessment and Policy (ACCAP)’s climate specialist, Rick Thoman. This podcast, hosted by Liz Carter, is made by ACCAP in partnership with Alaska Voices. In this episode Rick Thoman describes how he came to love weather, climate and Alaska. Starting in childhood, the episode follows Rick from elementary school projects on Alaska and tracking the weather in Pennsylvania to his first Alaska trip in 1986 that launched his weather and climate career.

“I’ve been interested in weather and climate from my earliest memories. As a child, probably late elementary school, junior high school age, every morning I would get up and I would look at the temperature on the thermometer that was outside my bedroom window. And I would write it down and I would plot it on a piece of graph paper.” – Rick Thoman

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