First of two fronts to lower temperatures in Florida. How long will the cooler weather last?

ORLANDO, Fla. – We have been closely monitoring the movement of two individual polar boundaries expected to shift across the Central Florida area, the first of which arrives Friday.

In fact, you’ll want to keep an eye on your thermostat as temperatures are expected to drop in the late afternoon and early evening hours.

As the front moves south, we expect cloud cover to increase. This will help insulate our afternoon temperatures and keep us around 70° across much of the Orlando area.

The chance of rain appeared to be much higher on Thursday than it was on Friday morning as we expected that the models could exaggerate the intensity of showers and isolated storms. You could still see some rain during the first half of your Friday, but not nearly as heavy as previous model forecasts suggested.

You will immediately notice that a front has moved through and you are in a “different air mass” once the wind shifts to a more northerly direction in the early evening. The drier air will also move into your local area as it moves further south, potentially clearing away much of the cloud cover that could form on the leading edge of the cold front.

Winds could become stronger, especially on Saturday afternoon as the sun rises. We’re expecting windy conditions with occasional gusts between 15 and 20 mph thanks to the movement of this cooler air and the approach of a secondary polar thrust just behind this, which is expected to give us a beautiful weekend.

The second cool boundary will likely contribute to the drop in temperatures we are expected to experience Friday evening and into the weekend. Our coolest day will now be Monday night into Tuesday morning, where we could see temperatures in the upper 30s and lower 40s across the entire Florida peninsula, especially the further inland you go. No rain is expected during the second outbreak of cold air from the north.

All in all, Friday is a good day for shopping if you want to take advantage of the Black Friday specials in town. Pack your umbrella just in case!

As the front moves through during the day, there is a chance of light to moderate precipitation or an isolated thunderstorm developing as there is a little more energy in the atmosphere to be harnessed.

If you plan to continue shopping or being out and about, conditions will improve by Friday evening and temperatures will already be dropping. So dress a little warmer, especially if you plan to be outdoors until the early hours of the morning.

Saturday and Sunday should be pretty spectacular for all of us, assuming you enjoy these periods of cooler weather.