For the first time in 2023, the weather will be heading below average as temperatures are set to drop at the end of the week.

Since the weather recuperated from the extreme cold in December, January has seen near-constant above-average warmth with temperatures often near the freezing point.

Now that will be plummeting, as a polar vortex is placing itself over the southeast.

Environment Canada Meteorologist Terri Lang explains that the cold is moving in right after the current system passes by.

"Once the last weather system moves through we're looking to be moving into the deep freeze, and we're going to be in it for a while. Those temperatures are going to drop into the minus 20s, probably towards minus 30 overnight so more like winter as we know it."

It's also likely that said cold will be sticking around for a while, since that cold air doesn't change around too much.

"The arctic air, it tends to be quite stable. It's cold, it's dry, won't get a lot of snow out of it," said Lang, "So just hard to move once it gets kind of settled in. Then it's hard to get it out of there, so we'll see how long we're going to be in it, but for the time being the long-range forecasts are showing that we're going to be in the cold air for a while."

There's also a chance that the cold leads to dangerous driving conditions, as the current warm air could lead to melt that subsequently freezes up on roadways.

You can find more information on the forecast on discover Estevan and you can check out some of the latest road reports from the highway hotline.