Fall-like pattern settles into the commonwealth this week

The much anticipated shift in our weather pattern kicked in nicely to end the weekend and kick off the final week of August across Central and Eastern Kentucky with cool high pressure bringing an early preview of the fall season. After starting out in the low 50s, it was a delightful Monday across the board with sunshine and afternoon highs in the mid-70s, a solid 10 degrees below average for this time of the year. This will be a prelude of things to come in the next few days.

Your A/C should get a much needed breather again on Tuesday as we see another ideal day for late August across the area. Temperatures will begin the day in the low 50s with some of the outlying areas dropping into the upper 40s. With more sunshine on tap, afternoon highs will climb back into the mid-70s and it should feel fantastic, especially given the persistent humidity of the past several months this summer has gone away for a while with a very dry air-mass remaining in place.

With cool Canadian high pressure overhead and an optimal set-up for some decent radiational cooling, record low temperatures could be possible into Wednesday morning as readings drop toward the 50 degree mark here in Lexington. Most locations should drop into the upper 40s to around 50 degrees and Lexington’s record low on Wednesday morning is 49 degrees set back in 1968. Any way you slice it up, look for a cool morning and a light jacket may come in handy for the early birds. It will be mostly sunny and breezy on Wednesday with highs remaining in the mid-70s. Near record lows look possible again Thursday morning (our record low is 50 set back in 1986 here in Lexington) with lows in the low-50s expected although a wave of low pressure to the southwest could throw some high level clouds our way and slow the cooling down a bit. No matter what it should still be very pleasant with mainly sunny skies into the late week and highs creeping up into the upper 70s.

Looking ahead to Labor Day weekend and the Cats kicking off the 2025 football season at home Saturday against Toledo at 12:45pm, Mother Nature should cooperate nicely with more delightful weather as a reinforcing shot of high pressure builds into the Great Lakes. This should keep our weather warm and dry with more sunshine and afternoon highs climbing back to around the 80 degree mark. It may be a battle between the high pressure to the north and a wave of energy to our southwest into Sunday and Labor Day, so we may end up seeing the return of a pop-up storm chance as a result. This looks to be a very low end with minimal impacts if it comes together so it shouldn’t impact any holiday weekend plans outdoors and temperatures will remain nice as we close out the month of August.