Winter officially begins Wednesday, ending a bizarre Fall in Central Florida

As Florida finishes baking near 90 degrees and your grandmother in Green Bay has finally warmed back above zero, winter is about to officially begin Wednesday morning at 5:44 a.m. EST.

And it’ll end a very unique fall in central Florida. The main event being, of course, Hurricane Matthew. As the first major hurricane to hit Florida in more than 10 years, Matthew’s bizarre track brought the eyewall passing over Cape Canaveral, cranking winds to 100+ mph. As Matthew tracked onward, it would then help draw dry air into Florida officially ending our rainy season.

Once the dry season began, boy was it ever dry. Less than ¼ inch of rain fell between Hurricane Matthew and the first of December. December would later bring higher rainfall amounts, but we would soon end the season with a nearly 3.5-inch rainfall deficit since Hurricane Matthew.

In addition to the overly dry fall weather in central Florida, it was hot! The first 20 days of December averaged more than 6 degrees warmer than normal. Ten days warmed above 80 degrees in Orlando and one hit 88 degrees! That’s the hottest December day since 1978. And the mornings? There were only two mornings cooler than 50 degrees so far this fall season. We average 20 mornings below 50 degrees for October, November and December in Orlando.

All in all, a warm and dry fall season in central Florida…which follows the playbook of the current La Nina climate pattern rule book.

So now that winter’s about to begin, what does it have in store for Florida?

Initially a warm up…expect more 80s as we get closer to Christmas…and then possibly a push of considerably colder air around New Year’s Eve.

But the warmer and drier than normal winter is expected to continue through the winter season in Florida. Now that doesn’t mean we won’t feel those 40s or even 30s again…we will. If you like the cool air, be patient, we have all January, February, even March to get a good cold front.

Cox Media Group