Cold weather hits Tri-Cities, but will it last?

Bundle up the kiddos and pull out the doggie sweaters.

The Tri-Cities is in for an unusually cold week for early December, according to the National Weather Service.

But the month still could average warmer than usual, according to the agency’s outlook for December.

It predicts that average Tri-City highs this month could be above normal, which fall from about 43 degrees at the start of the month to about 39 degrees at the end of December.

Lows typically drop from about 30 degrees at the start of the month to about 27 degrees at the end of the month.

The month is starting out with a cold snap.

The weather service does not expect the highs to get more than a couple of degrees above freezing for the rest of this week in the Tri-Cities.

Highs will drop from about 40 degrees Tuesday to about 33 to 35 degrees at the Tri-Cities Airport through the weekend, which is about 10 degrees colder than usual.

Lows will drop to 23 to 25 degrees from early Tuesday morning through the weekend, according to the weather service.

Drivers will need to be on alert for slick roads on their morning commute. Patches of freezing fog are forecast most days from 10 p.m. to 10 a.m.

Don’t expect any snow with the cold temperatures.

The weather service sees no chance of precipitation in the Tri-Cities through mid month.

Although a La Niña is in place, it is weak and not producing the cooler and wetter weather often linked to it.

December is expected to be drier than usual, according to the weather service.

Normal precipitation in the Tri-Cities is about 1.12 inches in December.

November was a little warmer and also wetter than usual for the Tri-Cities.

Temperatures averaged 1 to 2 degrees above normal in different parts of the Tri-Cities, according to the weather service. The warmest temperature measured was 70 degrees on Nov. 23, and the coldest was 21 degrees on Nov. 7 at the Tri-Cities airport.

Enough rain and a bit of snow fell to be on 14 days at the Pasco airport and on 17 days in Richland. Precipitation totaled 1.38 inches in November in Richland, which was about a third of an inch above normal.

The peak wind gust for the month in the Tri-Cities was 49 mph on Nov. 17 in Kennewick.

This story was originally published December 4, 2017 at 6:45 PM with the headline "Cold weather hits Tri-Cities, but will it last?."