The tri-state got a slight warm-up Wednesday ahead of a looming deep freeze that may bring the coldest temperatures of an already frigid winter season, Storm Team 4 says.
Although some areas woke up to subzero conditions, temperatures climbed back to the freezing mark in and around the five boroughs by the afternoon.
Some snow flurries moved Wednesday night but shouldn't leave behind anything more than a slippery coating to 1 inch of snow.
Temperatures will struggle to climb out of the teens Thursday and they will quickly drop to about 2 degrees in the city by the evening. With snowpack in place across much of the area and a very cold air mass entering the area, temperatures are expected to nosedive Thursday night and Friday morning into the single digits to below zero, Storm Team 4 says.
Temperatures could be the coldest of the season, with the mercury possibly plummeting close to 0 in the city early Friday. Storm Team 4 forecasts lows of 2 or 3 degrees in Central Park and at JFK and LaGuardia airports, which would smash the 7 degree record low Feb. 20 temperatures for those areas. In Newark, Storm Team 4 forecasts a low of 1 degree, which would beat the city's previous 5 degree low. And in Bridgeport, Connecticut, low temperatures could reach negative 3 degrees.
Despite a full day of sunshine, high temperatures Friday afternoon will only be in the upper teens, Storm Team 4 says. Temperatures Friday afternoon will be about 25 degrees below seasonal averages.
As with this season's previous arctic snaps, the cold weather will be accompanied by blasting wind gusts of up to 40 mph.
The freeze follows a pair of wintry weather patterns that dumped several inches of snow on parts of the tri-state and brought record-setting cold and whipping winds to parts of the region earlier this week.
