All three of Alaska's major cities saw record temperatures over the weekend amid a statewide heat wave that is coming to an end this week.

According to statements from the National Weather Service, about a dozen locations across the state tied or broke their daily record temperatures since Friday. On Saturday, McGrath and Delta Junction in the Interior hit a high of 78 degrees and a low of 49 degrees, respectively, edging out records set in 2005 and 1988. Cold Bay on the Alaska Peninsula reached 63 degrees Sunday, 2 degrees above its 2014 record for that date.

In Fairbanks on Saturday a high of 82 shattered a century-old record of 80 degrees set in 1915. By Sunday, Anchorage was reporting a record 72 degrees -- 7 degrees above the previous high of 65 degrees, set in 2014 -- and Juneau International Airport hit 75 degrees, beating the date's previous 1993 high by 2 degrees.

Bethel recorded 73 degrees Monday, edging out its 1996 high of 72 degrees. Even Barrow got in on the action Friday, with high and low temperatures of 42 and 32 degrees breaking records of 38 and 30 degrees set in 1928 and 1996, respectively.

Anchorage-based NWS meteorologist Christian Cassell said Monday that easterly wind flows helped drive warm high-pressure systems over the weekend, which prevailed across a swath of the state extending from King Salmon to Seward.

"Even for mid-May it was a fairly strong high, so that's why so many of the records went by the wayside," Cassell said. "The long-term pattern for the last couple of years has been incredibly warm too -- so when you combine those two things, those two things together really combine to help a lot of those really high record temperatures."

University of Alaska Fairbanks climatologist Brian Brettschneider said that Anchorage has set record high temperatures at a rate that puts it on track to have its most ever this year, breaking a record set in 2003.

Anchorage now with 2nd most number of record highs for any year. Still 63% of year left! #akwx @NWSAnchorage pic.twitter.com/P0BpbeM3Nu Brian Brettschneider (@Climatologist49) May 16, 2016

"Given that there's 65 years of record, you'd expect, if everything was completely independent, six days out of each year would have a record temperature," Brettschneider said. "With 63 percent of this year to go, you would expect four more records; statistically, it would be almost impossible for us to not break that record."

Brettschneider called the state's weather "anomalously warm for the current state of the atmosphere," although he added that it's not clear the state's climate has changed in the long term.

"It's unlikely that this is the new normal but it's likely that there is a new normal that's different than it's been in the past," Brettschneider said.

Alaska Fire Service spokesman Tim Mowry called the weekend's weather, marked by minimal lightning strikes Saturday, "our first warm snap of the season."

"Surprisingly, we didn't have much fire activity," Mowry said. "There's been a lot of talk about fire danger and the potential for a severe fire season, and we'd like to think that message is getting across."

Roughly 1,000 lightning strikes hit the state Sunday, Mowry said, igniting Alaska's third lightning-caused fire of 2016 -- an 8-acre blaze near Tok, which was initially attacked by a team of smokejumpers. They were set to be relieved Monday by a fire crew from the Tanana Chiefs Conference.

"It's pretty much wrapped up now," Mowry said.

The only other major fire being tracked by the service over the weekend, Mowry said, was the 2-acre blaze that burned part of the Campbell Creek Greenbelt near Martin Luther King Jr. Drive and Elmore Road. All burning in Anchorage was suspended in the wake of the blaze, with fire crews advising people to "use extreme caution" to avoid igniting additional fires.

While people don't think of Anchorage as a major wildfire source, Mowry said some parts of town are still vulnerable.

"There is a lot of forested woodlands within the city," Mowry said. "Anywhere you've got fuels, you can have fire."

For Anchorage, at least, the current warm spell will likely meet its end on Monday. Cassell said the local forecast calls for clouds and rain closing in overnight and then continuing into next weekend.

"We're going to see lots of showers and maybe some steady light rains at times," Cassell said. "It's definitely going to feel a lot cooler than what we've seen over the last three days."

Mowry thanked people for keeping fires statewide to a minimum over the weekend -- but also warned them not to get complacent because of "a little rain."