Unseasonal deluge to bring wet and windy end to Australia’s east coast winter dry spell
The winter dry spell is set to end this week with the east coast of Australia set to receive a deluge leading up to the weekend, while record-breaking rainfall is expected for parts of northern Australia.
A cold front moving towards the east coast will bring coastal showers and wet weather to most of the New South Wales and Queensland coast.
The period of wet weather is predicted to last into the middle of next week, with areas of the NSW south coast and Illawarra region likely to be the hardest hit.
“What will be causing this rain is a deepening low-pressure trough near the east coast. Within that trough, we’re expecting to see multiple low-pressure centres that will be the focus of potentially heavy rain over the next week,” said Weatherzone meteorologist Ben Domensino.
Domensino said it would be clearer over the next few days how severe the wet weather would be, but it was still too early to tell if an east coast low system, which could bring heavy rainfall for an extended period, would form.
The wet weather may reach as far inland as the Australian Capital Territory
but would be “unlikely” to impact Victoria in any major way according to Domensino, with Melbourne expected to receive only a few showers.
The Bureau of Meteorology’s senior meteorologist Christie Johnson said bureau aqua teams would be closely monitoring the situation over the next few days; particularly along the NSW south coast and parts of southeast Queensland, where many catchments are still very wet and susceptible to flooding.
She said while in the worst case there could be an extended period of wet and windy weather, most of the bureau modelling shows the conditions will not last long.
“If there are any flood watches issued, they’ll probably be issued either tomorrow or Saturday, so keep an eye out for that. At the moment, there’s no particular catchments that we’re really particularly worried about,” said Johnson
on Wednesday.
The Northern Territory and parts of western Queensland can expect up to 20mm of rain tomorrow as a cloud band forming ahead of a coastal trough brings tropical moisture to the coast.
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“Rainfall totals will generally be fairly moderate, we’re talking maybe five to 20 millimetres today and the same tomorrow, which is not heavy rainfall likely to cause flooding,” said Johnson.
“But the monthly average rainfall in that part of the world in June and July tends to be in the low single digits; so very unusual rainfall. The highest [rainfall] that area has ever seen in June is 20 or 30 millimetres, so it will likely be a record.”
Temperatures will remain lower than average across the east coast until at least next week.
On the west coast, conditions will probably be clear and sunny over the weekend, with a cold front potentially affecting them on late Monday. However, Johnson says it is too early to know the extent of the weather that this cold front may bring.