Hug your Honey Weather Tonight

We are forecasting the season's first frost and/or freeze for some area for this overnight and early Friday morning. In general this "first" frost is a bit ahead of the average dates for a first frost. Here is a map of the average times for first frosts for NY State from Cornell University

For the Adirondacks of NY tonight's expected frost is fairly close to normal time of occurrence but for other locations that are under a frost advisory its about 10 days to 2 weeks sooner. Here is where freeze and frost warnings are posted for the NEWS10 viewing area:

Here are some of the low temperatures that we are forecasting for tonight for the Adirondacks, Mohawk Valley, Upper Hudson Valley and Vermont. By the way, the record low for September 6th for Glens Falls is 34° set in 2000, so there could be some record lows for that location

For the rest of the viewing area here are tonight's expected lows

The record low for Albany is 38° set in 1938 so we could take a run at this record if we calm out quickly over night. Below are the average dates for the first frost for a few select locations, including the earliest and latest dates for the occurrence of  the first frost. (Thanks to my colleague Steve Caporizzo for the images and data).

For the Adirondacks and Glens Falls the chances to get a first frost of fall before Sept 10th-14th period is 10% probability of occurrence; so this is indeed a rare occurrence and if it does happen, for some locations it could be the earliest occurrence date ever! Keep in mind that local climates can affect frost formation. For example, if a location is near a body of water then frost formation could be delayed or not happen at all due to the warming effects that that water body exerts locally. Conversely a valley  under the right conditions of no warming effects from a body of water, clear skies, calm winds and cold air drainage (from off the mountains surrounding the valley) can radiate heat efficiently at night and chill down quiet easily.

Now tonight's expected frost and/or freeze will have more of an impact on an individuals garden (like mine where I still have plenty of green tomatoes!) versus impacting fruit orchards like apples. As a matter of fact tonight's cold weather is actually good for the apples and should make for some fine picking very soon!