A frosty night ahead....lows will bottom out in the mid 20s to lower 30s for inland areas which will break daily records for Feb. 29th ("leap day" so there are roughly only thirty-one Feb. 29's going back to the mid to late 1800s...i.e. the sample size is relatively small from a statistical standpoint). Winds will become onshore -- from the east & northeast later tonight which should keep the beaches above freezing & possibly rising into the low to mid 40s by sunrise. This wind shift will also have a bearing on temps. inland for up to 20 miles including the I-95 corridor where temps. could drop to the frosty upper 20s to low 30s before midnight or so but then rise some later at night as the light east wind blows off the Atlantic.
Looks like we'll be done with low temps. near or below freezing for the forseeable future (though about every other year, we have at least one freeze in March...& had one in April last year!)...the next weather story will be an intense storm system early next week. Here's the obvious:
** this will be a powerful storm system
** a severe storm outbreak will occur across the south & southeast U.S.
** heavy snow just northwest of the track of the low though this storm will not have the cold following in behind that previous systems have had.
** a warm-up for the First Coast in advance of the storm Mon. into Tue...rain & storms Mon. night into Tue...lots of wind for the area as the storm cranks up near the eastern seaboard.
The not so obvious:
** the track
** exact timing though the greatest impact on the First Coast does appear to be Mon. night through Tue.
As mentioned above, Fri. is "leap day". Click here for an excerpt from The Farmer's Almanac on why we leap...do we leap too much?...& births on Feb. 29th.
Our Jax N.W.S. is conducting Skywarn spotter classes with a Duval Co. class to be held in April. Click here for info. from the N.W.S. that includes all their Skywarn classes.
