GREENSBORO, N.C. — Cold air is coming, and even though it's October some frosty mornings aren't out of the question here in North Carolina this week. You want to be ready for it, and the WFMY News 2 Weather Team is helping you prepare.
Cold Air Moving South
Here's the weather setup. A strong dip in the jet stream is allowing cold air to flow freely into the eastern half of the country.
Notice the graphic below. When the jet stream cuts south like that, cold air moves in along high pressure from Canada. With high pressure to our northwest we get chilly winds that blow straight in from the north down the East Coast.
Through the end of the week, we can expect cold mornings.
Thursday & Friday Mornings the Coldest
The coldest mornings of the week are likely to be on Thursday and Friday. That's when most all of us should be in the 30s to start the day.
For our Triad cities, plan on a clear sky and temperatures in the mid to upper 30s for Thursday morning and again for Friday morning. In the more rural outlying areas temperatures will be a few degrees colder than that.
Patchy frost will be possible in areas that dip below 35 degrees.
A hard frost or hard freeze is not expected with this round of cold air.
Protect Plants
You probably have some plants leftover from the summer season. Many warm weather plants won't tolerate temperatures that get down into the 30s and 40s. How to best protect them for a temporary cold weather snap?
If you have potted plants outside, you can consider bringing them inside or into a garage. This will keep them warm enough to prevent any damage for a few nights.
If you have annual flowers or plants you can go ahead and cover them up. The best idea is to use fabric, not plastic. Water the plants during the day when it's still warm outside. The plants will drink up this water and it will help to keep them a bit warmer overnight. Cover them with fabric at sunset. Take the fabric off quickly in the early morning before the sun is shining brightly on the plants. This will prevent any damage.
First Snow of the Season in North Carolina
On Tuesday afternoon and evening the NC mountains picked up some snowfall behind our cold front. This is the first of the season. It's a bit early for that to happen, but not unhead of either.