Reflecting on the differences between the Yukon and Mombasa

There are many, many differences between May Village in the Yukon and Mombasa, Kenya.  One is a continental polar climate while the other is a tropical equatorial climate.  One rests in the interior of a large continent while the other rests on the coast of another continent.  One experiences a majority of its year in cold temperatures while the other has never had a day that would compare.  One is known and described for its dry conditions and the other is known for the humid conditions.  One location is known for its days with little to no sunlight while the other has the same amount of sun everyday (respectively).   Even right now as I write about and compare these two locations the temperature difference is 77⁰F: The Yukon is showing a temperature of -2⁰F, while Mombasa has a temperature of 79⁰F.  Tomorrow Mayo Village is predicting a high of -1⁰F while Mombasa is predicting a high of 90⁰F.  All of these differences make for enormous variations in the two locations climate.

The dominant wind patterns in the Yukon are influenced by the Polar easterlies but the wind patterns in Mombasa are influenced by the ITCZ, which will change the direction of the wind twice a year.  But the Yukon’s winds almost always flow from the East. 

When it comes to the differences they are apparent on the Köppen-Geiger climate classification.  Mayo Village is rated Dfc on this scale, which is a sub-arctic climate.  This area has large annual temperature difference that range from -24⁰F to 72⁰F and that high temperature only stays around for a short period of time.  This region is also characterized by very little precipitation, but the most of this occurs in July in general.  The area has long winters, which are extremely cold.  The area have very little sunlight with a LOW angle, that will drop to about 18⁰ in December and only get as high as about  64⁰ in June.  This does not allow for a lot of insolation to reach the surface.  Since there isn’t a whole lot of cloud cover in the area most of this insolation reaches the surface warming the area during the day, but then that radiation is quickly lost with the long nights causing a large diurnal variation of temperatures.

In Mombasa the Köppen-Geiger climate classification is Aw.  This is considered a Tropical savanna climate.  The angle of the sun in Mombasa stays rather constant averaging around 90⁰, but since the area rests on an ocean, all the insolation goes into the latent heat flux that causes the diurnal and annual temperatures to remain fairly constant.

These areas really have nothing in common with each other when it comes to climate or weather and are together a great example of enormous variations that happen on this Earth, all caused by continentality, water vapor,  solar irradiation, Coriolis effect, and the global wind patterns.  In this cause there are the differences between continental polar highs and the ITCZ, the extreme difference between solar angle and the difference between maritime and continentality conditions.