On Thursday, severe thunderstorms were anticipated for a significant portion of the nation, and wet weather was anticipated for the majority of central and eastern Australia during the next few days.
On Thursday, it was forecast that the east coast will be hit with intense precipitation, powerful gusts, and even enormous hail. This included the Sunshine Coast, the northern rivers of New South Wales, down to Sydney, and even sections of the northern tablelands.
According to a forecast provided by Helen Reid, a meteorologist at the Bureau of Meteorology, a slow-moving trough will continue to hit eastern and central Australia on Thursday, bringing with it the potential for severe thunderstorms.
These would place a primary emphasis on north-eastern and eastern New South Wales as well as south-eastern Queensland. According to Reid, thunderstorms that were less intense than those in western Queensland and north-western New South Wales were associated to thunderstorms that were occurring in central Australia, areas of South Australia, and also the Kimberley region of Western Australia.
She remarked, “There’s a pretty good chance that there will be some thunderstorm activity across a good portion of the countryside today.” “It is imperative that everyone is aware that we anticipate issuing warnings across significant portions of Australia today,” the official said.
“We could see some damaging wind gusts stretching through quite a broad area,” continued Reid. “These gusts could affect a lot of people.”
On Thursday afternoon, the potential for thunderstorm activity was anticipated to commence throughout the whole east coast. According to Reid, the amount of thunderstorm activity in the east was forecast to increase throughout the day and then die down in the evening.
She said, “We are expecting another batch of thunderstorms to move through eastern parts of Queensland and NSW tomorrow, and they will be assisted by the movement of the trough.”
“As it goes north, we should see a decrease in, and possibly even an end to, the thunderstorm activity in north-eastern New South Wales and south-eastern Queensland.
“We’ll see the focus shift up into…the central highlands region of Queensland tomorrow and on the weekend, so that’ll just shift the focus a little bit for Saturday,” he said. “We’ll see the focus shift up into…”
The Bureau of Meteorology made its formal declaration of an El Nio climate pattern in September, which, as a rule, denotes less moisture in the atmosphere and fewer rain showers.
Reid stated that the El Nio pattern was representative of the entire season, but that there would still be dry spells during the year. According to her, the moisture was traveling all the way from the tropics to Australia, where it was “helped by the surface features of the trough and the wind’s shifting through there.”
Reid warned that some regions of the state might still expect hot conditions over the coming days despite the fact that approximately fifty fires were burning across the state of Queensland.
On Thursday, some areas were expected to see temperatures that were up to 10 degrees Celsius higher than typical. Highs of 44 degrees Celsius were projected for Longreach, with highs of 43 degrees Celsius for Winton and 42 degrees Celsius for Mount Isa.
The Bureau of Meteorology reports that even nocturnal temperatures may be up to 8 degrees Celsius above average in some locations.
On the other hand, the thunderstorms are expected to travel north throughout the course of the weekend, which may bring some relief.
“It’s going to be migrating further north to those areas that are most affected as that trough moves through and moves cooler air into the south-west,” Reid said. “Those are the areas that are going to be most impacted.”
“There will be a little bit of relief coming through for those people who have been suffering due to the conditions of a heatwave.”
