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The coldest air of the season is plunging as far south as Florida through the weekend, bringing below-average temperatures to more than 270 million people after what has been the warmest fall on record for many places across the eastern and central US.
Behind the departing Nor’easter, a large dip in the polar jet stream is allowing cold Canadian air to spill across the entire eastern US, including the Southeast and Florida.
According to the FOX Forecast Center, frost and freeze conditions will extend across more than 30 states east of the Rockies. More than 30 million people woke up to Cold Alerts Saturday across six states in the Deep South and Southeast.
After daytime highs in the 70s across the Southeast this week, temperatures dipped into the 30s and 40s this weekend.
People in Central Florida, including Orlando and Tampa woke up to crisp morning lows in the mid-to-upper 40s on Saturday.
North Florida and the Panhandle dropped into the upper 30s to lower 40s.
This is also the first freeze for parts of the Midwest, as well as the Mississippi and Tennessee valleys. “Prolonged autumn warmth driven by El Niño delayed typical freeze dates by several weeks,” the FOX Forecast Center said.
Across the Central Plains, Omaha, Neb., and Kansas City saw overnight low temperatures drop into the mid-to-upper 20s, marking their first hard freeze of the season.
Omaha just missed tying its record for its latest first freeze, set in both 1915 and 2015, about a month later than the city’s average first freeze date. Earlier this week, NOAA determined that Super El Niño conditions have taken hold, while 2015 was the previous Super El Niño.
Meanwhile, major cities along the Great Lakes, including Chicago and Detroit, are expected to see their first sub-freezing temperatures of the season this weekend.
All told, more than 30 states will see below-average temperatures by the end of the weekend.
However, NOAA expects this cold shot to be short-lived, with warmer temperatures returning by midweek.
