Several schools in northern areas of the Matanuska-Susitna Borough School District were closed Friday due to "weather and road conditions" in the region, amid reports of dangerous conditions along the Parks Highway between Willow and Talkeetna.
An update early Friday on state road-conditions website 511.alaska.gov warns of dangerous conditions from Mile 75 to Mile 140 of the Parks, including "freezing rain, black ice, (and) extremely treacherous road conditions."
"Use caution when traveling through this area -- travel is not advised," state officials wrote.
In a Facebook post early Friday, the borough listed the following schools as closed:
• Trapper Creek Elementary School
• Talkeetna Elementary School
• Su Valley Jr/Sr High School
• Willow Elementary School
• Beryozova School
"All other traditional MSBSD schools are open," district officials wrote.
The district also canceled a pair of activity buses for wrestling groups, which were scheduled to head to Fairbanks from Palmer High School and Wasilla High School.
Michael Kutz, a public desk meteorologist at the Anchorage station of the National Weather Service, said conditions in the Susitna Valley overnight included a major snow dump west of the Parks Highway along much of its length.
"A lot of locations west of the Parks got up to 8 inches of snow," Kutz said. "And now they're starting to see a little bit of mix in the action -- mixed rain and snow."
The weather service's Friday forecast for the Mat-Su calls for cloudy conditions, with scattered rain and snow along with patchy morning fog, in high temperatures near 40 degrees. By evening the region should see isolated snow showers, with lows in the mid-twenties to lower thirties.