JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Bomb Cyclone crushes coastal towns from Georgia to New England.
Call it what you want but the system that dumped heavy rains in Jacksonville on Wednesday, then ripped up the east coast of the United States with coastal winds/flooding equal to that of a category 1 hurricane has now moved into Canada.
Snowfall amounts up the east coast ranged from a trace at Tallahassee to nearly 6" in Charleston (3rd most in their history) to 12-18" in Central Park New York to Boston.
Meanwhile, Jacksonville wakes up to a hard freeze warning, which means that temperatures are expected below 28° for longer than two hours.
Overnight river breeze spares Jacksonville from record cold
This morning's (Friday) record low for Jacksonville is 23° and was set in 1999. Our forecast is for 23-24° for the official low at the airport, which is where the National Weather Service of Jacksonville office is located. Our forecast for St, Augustine is 27°. St Augustine's record low is 28°, set in 2010.
But, our overnight temperatures only slowly chilled as the River breeze kept the atmosphere mixed allowing temperatures to level off in the mid 20s to the West of I-95. Away from the St, Johns River, rural locations that typically get colder and along I-75 there maybe have a backyards that dip into the upper teens!
Splitting Hairs
Whatever the final morning temperatures, everyone, area-wide, should be concerned with heating your homes safely. As always, you should not use space heaters while you sleep. Be careful not to over extend wall outlets, breakers sometimes don't trip, potentially leading to electrical fires.
Cars will be slow to start and those how haven't properly maintain their cars may have a rude awakening this morning.
Even beyond this morning's freeze, outdoor pets and plants need to be brought in or protected from the cold. There is yet another freezing night heading our way for tonight and Saturday morning.
Another major concern tonight is homes that are on well water. In these homes- when you lose electricity you also lose water (the pump providing water pressure has no power) and residents have limited means to heat their homes with no power and no way to drip they pipes. Carbon monoxide poisoning is a huge concern overnight for fuel based free-standing heaters brought inside.
Temperatures should climb above freezing by 10:00a.m. and under sunny skies we will warm into the 40s.
But wait! We aren't done yet with the freeze. Saturday morning will again bring freezing conditions all the thw to the beach. Why? Because Saturday morning will be with absolute clear skies and with little doubt, calm winds which should allow evening and overnight temperatures to again bottom out in the 20s to 30° along the beach.
When will it FINALLY warm up? We get above freezing Saturday night/Sunday morning and then Monday afternoon we will make it into the upper 60s.