On Sunday Oct. 11, 2015, the calendar suggested it was fall, but the thermometer begged to differ. Unseasonably warm weather bathed the Midwest and Great Plains, even exceeding 90°F in parts of Iowa, Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska and the Dakotas.
But in a matter of days, the weather discussion will take a turn for the colder, with frost possible for much of these same geographies.
The culprit is a series of cold fronts throughout the week that will drag down colder air from Canada, according to The Weather Channel meteorologist Quincy Vagell.
“The first wave will bring cooler air for midweek, but it’s the end of the week and this weekend that may present the coldest air of the season so far,” he notes. “Many cities could see their first official readings in the 30s so far this fall. This would result in the first frost and/or freeze of the season for parts of the Upper Mississippi Valley, Great Lakes, Ohio Valley and interior Northeast.”
That includes areas such as Minneapolis, Chicago, Cincinnati, Buffalo, Cleveland, Pittsburgh and New York City, Vagell says.
AccuWeather senior meteorologist Alex Sosnowski notes that the Great Lakes may help to moderate cold air to an extent, but places further away from large bodies of water will definitely be susceptible to frost this weekend [Oct. 17-18].
“Localized early morning freezing temperatures can extend from the Dakotas, Minnesota and Wisconsin to West Virginia, northern New Jersey, central Massachusetts and Maine,” he says.
Other areas could even see snowflakes falling in parts of Minnesota, northern Michigan, western and northern Pennsylvania, western Maryland, northern West Virginia and New England, Sosnowski adds.
For a frost/freeze index that updates daily, visit http://www.agweb.com/weather/frost-and-freeze-outlooks/. For all of AgWeb’s weather coverage, including local conditions, forecasts, news, analysis and more than a dozen agriculture-specific maps, visit www.agweb.com/weather.
