Severe thunderstorms are forecast to sweep across parts of south eastern Australia over the weekend. Damaging winds and heavy rainfall are expected to hit the south coast of NSW in the next few hours while warnings of flash flooding have been issued in Victoria.
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00:00We've got very humid air mass right across south-eastern Australia.
00:05We have seen a bit of minor relief through Adelaide and Melbourne, but just inland of
00:08those areas, we're seeing humidity levels similar to what we'd see in northern Queensland
00:13right across inland south-east Australia.
00:15That's what's driving all these warm, humid, cloudy conditions and these severe thunderstorms.
00:20Okay, so what's going to happen with these thunderstorms tonight and over the next couple
00:24of days?
00:25Yes, we've got rain and thunderstorms right across eastern South Australia, much of Victoria
00:29and New South Wales, and many of these storms are severe through parts of western, central
00:34and eastern New South Wales and into north-eastern parts of Victoria, where they're driving heavy
00:40rainfall and damaging winds.
00:41We've seen winds gusts in excess of 90 kilometres an hour at Bourke, and we're seeing falls
00:46of 30 to 40 millimetres in about half an hour to an hour under some of these storms as well.
00:50So if you're directly underneath them, they're likely to lead to flash flooding and maybe
00:54some localised damaging winds.
00:55So how heavy could that rain be, how much rain could fall over a couple of hours with
01:01some of these storms?
01:02Yes, definitely, if you're underneath one of these storms, we're likely to see very
01:06quick fire, 20 to 40 millimetres.
01:09And if you're under a couple of these storms, particularly in north-east New South Wales
01:12or south-east Queensland, we could see isolated totals of 50 to 80 millimetres.
01:16And these storms are then going to congeal into an area of rain tonight through north-east
01:20New South Wales and south-east Queensland.
01:23And because of that, a severe weather warning is current for heavy rainfall and damaging
01:26winds for our elevated areas in the Snowies and the Victorian Alpine areas, where we could
01:31see falls of 50 to 80 millimetres there, with isolated falls in excess of 100 possible.
01:36It feels like there's been a heap of warnings for storms over the last month or so.
01:42Is this usual for this time of year, or is it the case that there's actually been a bit
01:47more activity than usual?
01:49Yes, November into pretty much late October through Christmas is our peak storm season
01:54around the country.
01:55So it generally is pretty active, but with the record sea surface temperatures we're
01:59seeing around large parts of the country, that's providing a lot more moisture for these
02:03weather systems.
02:04So that's why we're seeing such extensive areas of thunderstorm activity over multiple
02:08days as well, as we haven't had a cold front to kind of clear out all this moisture across
02:13the country.
02:14And there'll be heatwave conditions for some places too over the coming days?
02:18Yeah, that's right.
02:19We have low to severe heatwave conditions through much of WA, central and northern South
02:24Australia, and that'll extend into northern New South Wales and southern Queensland in
02:28the coming days.
02:29And then as we move into the weekend and early next week, that heat will kind of contract
02:33into northern Australia and then start building across western and central parts of WA, and
02:39then some of that heat could get dragged to the eastern states by this time next week.