The first cool front of the fall will pass through the South early this week ushering in a dramatic and pleasant change in temperature and humidity.

As I am writing this on Monday, there is still some uncertainty as to the timing of the frontal passage. It could come as early as Monday night. However, there is also the possibility that the front may temporarily stall near our area Tuesday.

However, it is almost a certainty that by Wednesday at the latest, the winds several miles above us will have shifted to the northwest giving the surface front its final push down into the Gulf of Mexico.

By Thursday night a second mass of cool, dry air is predicted to surge into our area from the north.

All of that will combine to provide a stretch of gorgeous weather from Wednesday through the weekend for much of the southern United States from Texas eastward to Georgia.

In Pearl River County we will notice the biggest changes during nights and early mornings beginning tonight. Wednesday through Friday nights will be much cooler with low temperatures early Thursday through Saturday dropping into the upper or even middle 50s. We haven’t felt air that cool since early May nearly five months ago.

After Tuesday’s upper 80s, afternoon highs for the rest of the week are predicted to be in the lower to middle 80s. The change from the 90s of summer will feel even better because the

humidity levels will be drier than they have been in months. The muggy, sticky feel of summer will be history, at least for the rest of this week.

Temperatures Friday evening should be the coolest so far this football season, dropping into the 60s near game time.

Neighbors to our north will be getting an even stronger taste of fall. Early morning temperatures in some northern parts of Mississippi and Alabama are likely to dip into the upper 40s. Due to some cloudiness in parts of Tennessee on Thursday and Friday, highs in some areas of that state probably won’t make it out of the 50s on those days.

Sunny days and clear nights are on tap across Mississippi starting Wednesday and extending through the weekend. Our next chance of rain will be early next week.

This week’s weather should get us into an autumn frame of mind. So, it may be a little surprising if later this week you hear that a hurricane has formed in the eastern Caribbean Sea.

A strong and very large tropical wave in the trade winds is currently headed westward in the central Atlantic between Africa and the southern islands of the Lesser Antilles, such as Barbados, Tobago, and Grenada. Conditions are favorable for the wave to form into Tropical Storm Matthew later this week and possibly to strengthen further into a hurricane.

Even if Matthew does form and continue westward, it will still likely be 1,000 miles away from us next Monday. So, this week we can concentrate on enjoying a spectacular introduction to early autumn.

By Skip Rigney