Wild weather is expected across south-east Australia, with bushfires and snow predicted to hit Victoria in a 24-hour period in the coming days, and a warning of high temperatures, strong winds and severe bushfire risk in South Australia.
Conditions in New South Wales are expected to ease after severe thunderstorms and large hailstones lashed regions across the state.
Heavy rain in Sydney overnight brought to an end its longest dry spell in more than a century. The NSW State Emergency Service responded to about 250 emergency calls, mainly in the Hunter and metropolitan areas.
In Victoria, strong winds are expected to sweep across the Mallee region on Sunday, with already dry conditions adding to the bushfire danger rating, which is tipped to hit “severe”.
Hail in Nelson Bay!! Hurts when it hits you on the head😵 pic.twitter.com/TwMn9KRUi8
— James cannon (@Jimbocannon) October 26, 2017
“Victoria, probably not with this first front, but a stronger front later on Sunday could push the Mallee towards severe or into severe fire danger even though they have had some rain,” said a Bureau of Meteorology senior meteorologist, Scott Williams.
There had been a couple of warm days but the fuel had dried and there would be a lot of wind, Williams said. “We’ll be looking at the wind being the key reason to lift the fire danger,” he said.
But there would also be a rapid temperature drop of as much as 15C from Sunday into Monday, which could result in snow falling in alpine areas.
“And we’re likely to see a snow level on our ranges down to about 1,000 metres or so,” he said.
“It’s a really big contrast [and] just shows the waters to the south of continent haven’t increased in temperature much.”
In South Australia, severe conditions have been declared across much of the state as high temperatures and strong winds increase the risk of bushfires. The Country Fire Service has issued total fire bans and declared severe conditions across seven districts for Friday.
MetEye show Fri windy, fast moving change. This will bring potential thunderstorms & fire weather. For warnings https://t.co/5wxFrWeCue pic.twitter.com/Le7bt8K9iQ
— BOM South Australia (@BOM_SA) October 26, 2017
The Bureau of Meteorology has also issued a severe weather warning for the Eyre and Yorke peninsulas, Kangaroo Island and the Mount Lofty Ranges, with wind gusts of up to 90km/h possible.
Adelaide will have a maximum temperature of 32C on Friday but the mercury will push into the mid to high 30s in several regional centres. Oodnadatta, in SA’s north, is expected to be the hottest spot with a top of 40C.
The supervising meteorologist Matt Collopy says a fast-moving front will sweep across SA on Friday with strong northerly winds ahead of the change. He says there won’t be much rain but there is the possibility of thunderstorms as the system moves over the Adelaide Hills.
“We’re going to see very windy northerly conditions leading to severe fire danger,” he said.
Sometimes nature reminds us who is in charge - 4cm #hail stones in #Newcastle this afternoon pic.twitter.com/xcpQkN86j8
— James McGregor (@JamesMcGregorAU) October 26, 2017
Conditions in NSW are expected to ease after severe squalls and “dangerous” supercells developed across the Hunter and mid-north coast on Thursday afternoon and evening, bringing destructive winds, heavy rain and hailstones up to five centimetres in width in some areas.
Severe thunderstorms hit the southern tablelands, central tablelands and Sydney metro areas, with hailstones up to 3cm wide hitting Oberon in the central tablelands, the Bureau of Meteorology meteorologist Gabrielle Woodhouse said.
The storm activity continued throughout the night and is expected to ease by about lunchtime on Friday.
“The whole system that is producing the trigger is moving eastwards … so we will see thunderstorms move off to the east and by lunchtime, we should see it all out by the Tasman Sea,” Woodhouse said.
