While Georgia managed to avoid the effects of last week’s storm, which left snow in a wide swath from Texas to Michigan, and left hundreds of thousands of people without power, it looks like this week’s cold wave will bring the coldest temperatures yet this season to the area.

The map to the right shows the predicted lows for the US on Tuesday morning. Here in the Atlanta area, we’ll likely see temperatures below 25 degrees Tuesday morning, and maybe just slightly warmer on Wednesday. Monday isn’t likely to be any picnic either, with highs in the mid 40s, and blustery winds to make it feel even colder.

The good news is that these may be the lowest temperatures we see for the rest of the year. We’re somewhat due for a real killing frost: in my yard, the wood ferns are still growing, the ornamental peppers are still producing fruit, and a few volunteer impatiens are still blooming. They should all be history by Tuesday afternoon. Last year, we saw temperatures in the mid 20s before Thanksgiving.

There’s also some concern that we could see some wintry weather by the end of the week as a low pressure system in the Gulf brings moisture into the area as a high pressure system pushes colder air in from the Northwest. This morning’s forecast for Gainesville calls for a chance of freezing rain on Saturday morning, although it’s not predicted –yet– for metro Atlanta. It’s a situation that bears watching.

If early season weather is a predictor of what we’ll see in January and February, it’s going to be a bad winter. First, Buffalo, New York recorded record snowfall in October, and now a rogue storm is bringing pre-Thanksgiving snow to North Carolina and Virginia, while 10 degree below normal temperatures are making Atlanta feel like mid-January.

The nasty weather is being caused by a large low pressure system that sits stationary off of the Georgia coast (see below). Cut off from the jetstream, it is spinning around, bringing some of the coldest air of the season into our area, and causing rain, snow, and beach erosion along the coast. Temperatures in Atlanta have been 10 degrees below normal for the last two days.

Because the storm has not moved as quickly as earlier anticipated, our warmer weather has been delayed by a day or so, with the best day of the weekend now anticipated to be on Saturday. At least the storm is far enough east that the Atlanta area hasn’t been hit by the rain that is falling 1/4 inch per hour in Charlotte, with 40 MPH winds, or in Augusta, rain and sleet.

If you’re a long time Atlantan, you may remember the winter of 1992-1993, especially the end of it. That was the year that the spring race at Atlanta Motor Speedway got snowed out on March 14th, as over a foot of snow blanketed the area in what some called the “Storm of the Century”.

If the Accuweather winter forecast is to be believed, we could see similar conditions this year. Overall, Accuweather is predicting warmer than normal conditions for much of the Plains states, but cooler than normal conditions for the Southeast, including Georgia. Less snow than normal is predicted from the Pacific Northwest through the Dakotas and Minnesota, and more snow than normal is predicted across a broad swath from southern Nevada, through Oklahoma, and then widening from north Georgia northeast through Connecticut. North Georgia could see as much as 150% of normal snow.

The Accuweather folks disagree with the National Weather Service winter forecast, which was updated on October 19th, and calls for warm temperatures across much of the country, and normal temperatures in the Southeast, and wetter than normal conditions from Southern California through Texas, and in Florida and southeast Georgia and South Carolina.

The main difference in determining the two forecasts lies in the ultimate effect of the El Nino period that we are now in. The NWS thinks that will be the major influence on this winter’s weather, while Accuweather believes that the El Nino will not be as strong as advertised, and looks to analogs of similar winters, including the late snowing winter of 1992-1993 as models for what is to come this season.

Today, the National Weather Service issued a press release with their first look at what winter is shaping up to be in the United States for 2006. For metro Atlanta and North Georgia, we’re likely to see near normal temperatures, and equal chances of above, below, or normal precipitation.

Much of the country will likely see above normal temperatures, especially in the traditionally wintry states of Minnesota and Wisconsin. Near normal temperatures are expected for most of the Southeast, and a band stretching from Texas to North Carolina has equal chances of above or below normal temps. Apparently, the cold spot will be in Hawaii this year.

Wetter than normal weather is predicted for the southeast Atlantic and Gulf Coasts, stretching back through the desert southwest. Dry areas include much of Kentucky and Tennessee, and the Pacific Northwest.

The weather service is basing its forecast on the current El Nino pattern for the most part, and it is essentially the long range 3 month outlook produced back in September, and updated each month. (If you’re interested, the super long range outlook for Spring is for warmer than normal temperatures across much of the country).

In the shorter range, we are likely to get a bit of much needed precipitation this week. I’ve recorded about 3/4 of an inch of rain since September 13th, which was the last major rainfall date. That’s almost a month. Two cold fronts will pass through this week, on Wednesday, and again on Thursday, and the double blast will provide a chance for frost on Saturday morning. Then we’ll warm up a bit before another cold front hits late on the week of the 15th, dropping temperatures again.

Although winter outlooks typically don’t arrive until mid-October, Accuweather has released a preliminary look at the likely weather for Winter 2006-2007. Not surprisingly, the forecast is pretty typical of what you would expect for an El Nino year.

Meteorologist Joe Bastardi of Accuweather says that the weather along the east coast will likely be stormier than normal — typical of El Nino years. Bastardi predicts a relatively mild start to the season in the Northeast, followed by cooler weather in January and February. Whether this will lead to a greater chance of snowfall is really a matter of timing, since the cold Arctic air must be in place at the same time the storms are.

In the west, Bastardi says the weather is likely to be dryer than normal due to an extended high pressure system, and warmer than normal as well.

None of this is particularly earth-shaking, but again these are September predictions, three to five months out. Look for more specific Winter outlooks to be issued next month by all the major forecasters.

Taking a look at the weather in the short term, though, the cold front passed through the Atlanta area this afternoon, dropping dewpoints by 15 degrees between 2 and 6 PM as the storms cleared out. Behind the front is a taste of fall, with temperatures dropping into the 50s, and highs for the next few days not breaking 80. We may be getting into one of those annoying patterns where bad weather arrives just in time for the weekend for the next few weeks, with long range forecasts calling for a chance of rain this weekend, and again at the end of the month.