A colder start to the weekend is expected across the Great Lakes, the Northeast and into the Southeast. The afternoon temperatures across the major Northeast cities such as Boston, Philadelphia and New York City will be stuck in the 50s on Saturday. The cold air will progress into the South where major cities like Raleigh, North Carolina, and Savannah, Georgia, will record temperatures about 10-20 degrees below normal.
“It will certainly be a chilly start, even on Sunday across the mid-Atlantic and down into the Tennessee Valley and parts of the southeastern U.S.,” AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Courtney Travis explained. Spectators heading to Augusta National Golf Club for the final round of the Masters will need to dress warmly during the early hours of the day, Travis noted.
AccuWeather RealFeel® temperatures Sunday morning will be in the 20s and 30s across Virginia, the Carolinas, northern Georgia and Tennessee, making conditions feel more like late February than early April. Where the wind drops off and skies manage to remain clear at night, patches of early morning frost can occur in the normally cold locations this weekend.
A few snowflakes will be possible across the eastern Great Lakes and into the higher elevations of upstate New York, Pennsylvania and West Virginia into Sunday as cold rain showers drench the remainder of the Northeast, making for an unpleasant day for most.
Snow showers are also forecast break out across the Adirondacks and into the Green and White mountains on Sunday, but precipitation will be light and little to no snow accumulation is expected. AccuWeather forecasters urge those driving through snow showers to remain alert as visibility can be greatly reduced.
The unseasonable cold is expected to depart much of the East in the coming days, bringing a return to spring warmth as temperatures steadily rebound.
“Warm air that has been locked in the West will finally push eastward and bring temperatures that will be 10-15 degrees above average by the middle of next week,” AccuWeather Meteorologist Dean DeVore explained.
After a weekend in which temperatures in parts of the East were reminiscent of early March than early April, afternoon highs are expected to rebound into the 70s and 80s across the mid-Atlantic and Southeast as warm air surges northward.
Cities such as New York City, Raleigh and Richmond, Virginia, will experience a nearly 20-degree temperature swing from Sunday where highs will be in the middle 50s to lower 70s by Tuesday. Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., on the other hand, are expected to have a temperature swing of over 20 degrees between Sunday and Tuesday.
Temperatures will remain above average for this time of year into the middle of next week.
There is a key reason why the spring can bring such variable temperature changes, especially in parts of the East, forecasters say.
In the early stages of spring, there is usually still snow and ice on the ground in portions of the northern areas of the U.S. Temperatures in the northeastern part of the country at this time of year are highly dependent on whether the wind is blowing out of the south or southwest or from some northerly direction, especially for an extended period of time.
Spring is a season in which temperatures trend upward at a swift pace. However, there are often periods where this trend can experience setbacks as colder air out of Canada rushes back into the northern U.S. and plunges into the East and South depending on the orientation of the jet stream.
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