Unusually cold air is expected to cover much of the United States over the weekend and early next week, CNN reports. Temperatures will drop significantly below normal, and frost will likely even affect areas along the Gulf of Mexico.
After an unseasonably warm end to the year on Wednesday, cold air reached the northern U.S. on Wednesday and will spread east and south over the next few days. Only the western states will be affected by the cooling.
In Chicago, the temperature on Friday is expected to be around -6 degrees Celsius, and at night there will be several degrees of frost. Slightly higher temperatures are forecast for Kansas City, Missouri, St. Louis and Cincinnati. Double-digit frost will spread to Nebraska, Iowa and Illinois on Saturday, and in North Dakota overnight temperatures could drop below -20 degrees Celsius.
The National Weather Service (NWS) predicts that most of the central and eastern U.S., including the Gulf of Mexico, could experience 5 to 20 degrees below normal temperatures over the weekend. For example, in Orlando, Florida, thermometers are usually above 20 degrees Celsius at the beginning of the year, while in the coming days the temperature will probably barely exceed 10 degrees Celsius.
Forecasters warn that strong winds in some eastern states will cause temperatures to feel significantly lower.
Another cold wave
As CNN writes, this wave of cold “may be just an appetizer, as a more brutal onslaught of frost” is expected across the central and eastern United States on Monday and Tuesday.
Temperatures will likely be 10 to more than 30 degrees below normal early next week. Even along the Gulf of Mexico, thermometers can show negative values ​​at night. Temperatures rarely reach around freezing in New Orleans, and this is the first time this has happened since January of last year.
Over the next week, more than 70 percent of the country's population is expected to experience temperatures below zero, writes CNN.
Main photo source: worldview.earthdata.nasa.gov/X @NWS