{"id":169186,"date":"2026-03-20T13:11:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-20T13:11:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/169186\/"},"modified":"2026-03-20T13:11:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-20T13:11:16","slug":"spring-starts-today-but-what-does-that-mean-for-the-weather-nbc-new-york","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/169186\/","title":{"rendered":"Spring starts today! But what does that mean for the weather? \u2013 NBC New York"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>After a brutal winter that included extended deep freezes and a couple of monster snowstorms, we have reached the light &#8212; some light, at least &#8212; at the end of the tunnel.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The vernal equinox occurs at 10:46 a.m. on Friday, officially marking the beginning of astronomical spring.<\/p>\n<p>The sun aligns directly over the equator, and we experience nearly equal periods of daylight and dark.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1774012275_627_image_17910d.png\" loading=\"lazy\"   alt=\" \"\/><\/p>\n<p>After that, the Northern Hemisphere continues to receive more direct sunlight, which has a significant impact on our weather. Days get longer \u2013 and warmer \u2013 quickly!\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In fact, between March 20 and April 1, our average high temperature goes up 4 degrees \u2013 from 51 degrees to 55.\u00a0 And by the end of April, our average high is already closing in on 70!\u00a0 As hard as it is to believe, in just a month, wearing shorts and a T-shirt could be almost a regular occurrence.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1774012275_307_image_b07361.png\" loading=\"lazy\"   alt=\" \"\/><\/p>\n<p>But don\u2019t put away your warm jackets and coats just yet.\u00a0Spring is also a time when we get crazy temperature swings.\u00a0Think back to our 80-degree afternoon on March 10. Two short days and one powerful cold front later, we were languishing back in the 40s.<\/p>\n<p>Spring is a highly volatile season. Warm air from the south is ready to usher in summer, so it tries to displace our cold winter air.\u00a0 But the cold doesn\u2019t want to go without a fight, so it pushes back. We wind up in a tug-of-war, of sorts, with a push and pull between warm and cold that makes us wonder daily about wardrobe choices.<\/p>\n<p>This week is a perfect example.\u00a0Afternoon highs in the 30s on Wednesday quickly get replaced by 60s this weekend.\u00a0And then we crash back to the 40s on Monday.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1774012276_714_image_543af4.png\" loading=\"lazy\"   alt=\" \"\/><\/p>\n<p>The clash of air masses comes with unsettled weather, too.\u00a0Showers and storms are common when the two decide to rumble.\u00a0This weekend, we\u2019ll have a couple of chances for rain \u2013 Friday night into Saturday morning and again Sunday night into Monday.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1774012276_748_image_143900.png\" loading=\"lazy\"   alt=\" \"\/><\/p>\n<p>Fortunately, no severe weather is likely, but you may need to pull out an umbrella.\u00a0Also fortunate: Most of the weekend looks dry, so you should be able to enjoy some spring weather on this first weekend of spring!<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1774012276_778_image_e25527.png\" loading=\"lazy\"   alt=\" \"\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After a brutal winter that included extended deep freezes and a couple of monster snowstorms, we have reached&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":168146,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[9,11,10,335,336,133],"class_list":{"0":"post-169186","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-new-york","9":"tag-new-york-headlines","10":"tag-new-york-news","11":"tag-nyc-weather","12":"tag-storm-team-4","13":"tag-weather"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169186","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=169186"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169186\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/168146"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=169186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}