Winter weather plunges into South Florida this weekend. Cold enough for 'frozen' iguanas?

A sauntering churn of winter winds is expected to plunge into South Florida near week’s end, sending temperatures tumbling and clearing melancholy December skies.

The National Weather Service in Miami is forecasting Saturday morning to be the coldest this week for the lower latitudes of the Sunshine State with an official overnight chill of 47 degrees in West Palm Beach and a high around 65 degrees.

Late December’s normal low temperature as measured at Palm Beach International Airport is 58 degrees with a normal high temperature of 75.

Cold weather forecast for other parts of Florida

Statewide, the robust area of low pressure dragging Canadian bluster into the subtropics will mean low temperatures in the 30s in Tallahassee, frost and a light freeze in Jacksonville, and highs in the 50s at Orlando-area theme parks.

More: El Niño in Florida can mean rainy, cool dry season, but climate change may blunt the chill

"The main story is going to be the morning low temperatures," said National Weather Service meteorologist Zach Law, who is based in Melbourne. "We're not forecasting any miserable rain."

Robert Garcia, an NWS meteorologist in Miami, said northwest winds on Friday and Saturday of about 10 mph could dip wind chill temperatures into the upper 30s in western Palm Beach County communities and areas closer to Lake Okeechobee. West Palm Beach hasn’t experienced a temperature in the 40-degree range since Jan. 17 when the low hit 49 degrees.

Cold weather shelters in Palm Beach County generally open when temperatures of 40 degrees or lower, or wind chills of 35 degrees or lower, are forecast for periods of four consecutive hours or more.

“The good news is it’s going to be dry,” Garcia said about the weekend. “It will be chilly, but we’ll be able to have some glimpses of sun on Saturday and then it will be sunny on Sunday.”

Although there were stints of heavy rain in Palm Beach County this month, including a total of 2.67 inches on Dec. 16 and 17, rainfall was less than an inch above normal in West Palm Beach through Christmas Day.

For the year, Palm Beach International Airport measured 73.6 inches through Dec. 25, which is about 12.5 inches above normal. That’s compared with Fort Lauderdale/Hollywood International Airport, which tallied 112 inches of rain for the same time period — an astounding 52 inches more than average.

Miami International Airport is nearing the end of the year with 82 inches of rain, which is about 15 inches more than normal.

At the same time, Gulf Coast counties are down rainfall for the year, with areas of Manatee, Sarasota and Pinellas in extreme drought. As of Tuesday, Naples had received 29.7 inches of rain for the year. That's nearly 20 inches fewer than normal.

Garcia said some minor coastal flooding in Palm Beach County is possible with patchy rains ahead of Friday’s cold front combined with lingering high tides from Tuesday's full moon. He’s recommending anyone going to the Orange Bowl at Hard Rock Stadium on Saturday to take a sweater or jacket.

“This weekend will definitely be a taste of winter,” Garcia said.

Contributing to the pending chill is a significant dip in the jet stream, which on Tuesday was raging over the southeastern United States from southern Texas through northern Florida. A more southern path of the jet stream — which flows at a height near the cruising altitude of commercial planes — is a hallmark of the periodic climate pattern El Niño .

More: How cold does it need to be to kill Florida's iguanas and Burmese pythons?

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced in June that El Niño had arrived, which traditionally means cooler and wetter winters for South Florida.

Earlier this month, NOAA said there is a 54% chance of El Niño becoming “historically strong” through January.

“An event of this strength would potentially be in the top 5 of El Niño events since 1950,” NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center wrote in its Dec. 15 forecast.

“It’s primarily El Niño driving the pattern right now,” said AccuWeather senior meteorologist Tom Kines. “Cloudy days are an impact of El Niño , but if the sun isn’t back on Friday, it will be there for the weekend.”

Kimberly Miller is a veteran journalist for The Palm Beach Post, part of the USA Today Network of Florida. She covers real estate and how growth affects South Florida's environment. Subscribe to The Dirt for a weekly real estate roundup. If you have news tips, please send them to kmiller@pbpost.com. Help support our local journalism, subscribe today.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: West Palm Beach weather: Cold front forecast for New Years weekend