Temperatures plunge 30 degrees overnight, warm weather to return later this week

Saturday it looked like March would go out like a lamb, but that changed early Sunday morning as temperatures plunged about 30 degrees.

Saturday’s high temperature was almost 70 degrees. Then a coldfront swept in from the Northwest shortly before dawn Sunday, dropping temps into the low 30s, according to Myranda Fullerton, meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Pittsburgh.

“That’s what provided this pretty drastic change in weather from yesterday to today,” she said.

Sunday’s chill is far colder the average temperature for March 31, which is in the mid-50s, Fullerton said.

However it is far warmer than the record low for this day — in 1923 the temperature dropped to 11 degrees.

But the cold isn’t expected to last long, Fullerton said.

“It will be cold today,” she said Sunday. “It will start to moderate after today, and we’ll start to see temperatures starting to climb back up.”

Monday’s temperatures will likely be in the 40s, and they will continue to climb over the next few days until the weather is more typically springlike.