AUTHORITIES in Alaska issued "Icemageddon" warnings as conditions swung from record heat to record snowfall in the state.

The unusual warning came after Alaska saw its hottest December day ever last week, with temperatures reaching 67F in Kodiak Island.

The town saw warmer weather than Southern California on December 26, which is notable because of how little sunlight Alaska receives this time of year.

In the town of Ketchikan in the southeastern part of the state, temperatures plunged to record lows — a chilly -0.4F on December 25, BBC News reported.

"December was a wild, wacky and impactful winter month weather-wise over much of Alaska," Alaska Center for Climate Assessment and Policy's Rick Thoman said on Twitter.

"From unusual cold to unprecedented warmth, excessive snowfall to record dry. Plus severe blizzards, crippling freezing rain and damaging winds."

'Icemageddon' warnings

The "Icemageddon" warnings stemmed from dangerous conditions brought on by ice, as hard as cement, covering roads.

The thick ice resulted from warm air that poured in from Hawaii, making Alaska's air turn from cold and dry to moist, according to the BBC.

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Heavy snow followed by torrential rain led to the thick ice coating the region, resulting in power outages and road closures.

The Alaska Department of Transportation warned the ice is extremely difficult to remove once it binds to the road surface.

"It's like cement on top of pavement and our plows and graders can't remove it," the department said.

"There's no quick fix for ice-covered roads, so conditions may remain difficult for some time."

Authorities issued the "Icemageddon" warnings as they worked to scrape and groove the surface of roads in order to make them passable.

Mr Thoman told the BBC that the ice would likely stick to the roads until March or April.

Record snowfall

While Kodiak saw unseasonably warm weather, a mid-winter storm, dubbed the fiercest since 1937, dumped more than 10 inches of snow on Fairbanks over Christmas, the BBC reported.

The snow caved in the roof of the grocery store in Delta Junction, 95 miles away.

Photos from Denali National Park showed its "snowiest December on record" with 6 feet of snowfall over the course of a month, according to The Charlotte Observer.

A whopping 54.8 inches of snow fell during a seven-day period at the park, and 60 inches on the ground on December 29 was a new record for snow depth.

Mr Thoman told the BBC that blasts of extreme warm and cold temperatures in the state over the past two decades are a sign of climate change.

"When all the pieces come together in a warming world we're going to get these unprecedented events, that's what we expect," he said.

Residents were bracing for more freezing weather in Juneau, where temperatures are forecast to drop through the week to possibly near-record conditions, the National Weather Service reported.

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