Cold in south, warm in west, dry in north
A high pressure system is pushing across the interior as a cold front moves over the south and east of the country. Strong to hazardous winds could hit parts of the east coast on Saturday May 18, 2024.
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NewsTranscript
00:00 Hi, it's Christy at the Bureau with your weekend weather update, focusing on the cold weather
00:04 over southeastern Australia, warm weather in the west and finally some dry weather in
00:08 the north.
00:09 So, looking at our synoptic pattern, the important thing to note here is this big high pressure
00:13 system sitting south of the continent, and that's the system that's going to give us
00:17 settled weather across much of the country today.
00:21 But in the southeast we do have this cold front.
00:23 Now, this system has moved over the southeast today and will continue up the coast of New
00:27 South Wales as we move through tonight and into tomorrow.
00:31 So as that moves up the coast on Saturday, we can see this strong area of southerly winds
00:37 pushing in behind it, and that's going to give us strong to gale force marine warnings
00:41 and also hazardous surf along the New South Wales coast.
00:45 We can also see that the showers associated with that system are quite coastal, perhaps
00:49 extending to the ranges but not to inland parts of the country.
00:54 As we move into Sunday, we can see this second front crossing Tasmania.
00:57 Now that's just keeping some showers and winds going but not adding too much in terms of
01:02 rainfall.
01:03 But this southerly surge continues up the coast and we do see strong winds pushing up
01:07 the coast of Queensland as well.
01:10 The other thing to note is that this system is bringing a strong southeasterly surge across
01:14 the interior part of the continent, and this is strong dry southeasterly flow, and that
01:20 does give us increased fire danger.
01:22 So we are looking at high fire dangers over the weekend through parts of Western Australia,
01:27 the Northern Territory, Queensland, Northeastern South Australia as well.
01:32 Also, as that combines with warm temperatures in the Pilbara, we could see extreme fire
01:37 danger and there is a fire weather warning out for parts of the Pilbara.
01:41 Finally, we have this cold front approaching the southwest.
01:44 Unfortunately, the high is going to block that, so it will slide southwards, maybe just
01:49 a couple of showers reaching the southwest coast of WA early next week.
01:55 So looking at our maximum temperatures, the first thing that jumps out is this cold air
01:59 over the southeast.
02:00 12 degrees for Hobart for maximum tomorrow, 13 in Canberra, 14 in Melbourne.
02:05 Now with all this cold air, we could see snow down to 500 metres over Tasmania and also
02:10 maybe some snow along the Alps in Victoria and the snowy mountains in New South Wales.
02:16 But we do maintain heat along the west coast, 29 degrees in Perth.
02:21 Now this could be the sixth day in a row above 28 degrees, which would be record breaking
02:25 for May for Perth, so a warm spell over there.
02:29 But as we move into Sunday, we can see that these areas of blue and green are extending
02:33 further north and west and much of the country is looking at below average temperatures with
02:38 this cold air behind the front extending right across the country.
02:43 Meaning warmth though along the west coast, still 28 degrees in Perth.
02:48 Looking at our minimum temperatures though, tonight we do see minimum temperatures down
02:52 in the low single digits, so a cold night tonight.
02:56 But the coldest air actually comes over us on Sunday and that's where we can see these
02:59 areas of light blue and white, that's potential areas of frost.
03:05 So we could say that extending across inland Victoria, New South Wales, even up into southern
03:11 parts of Queensland and into South Australia.
03:14 Also with that dry air pushing up into the north, we do see cooler temperatures, so 5
03:19 degrees overnight in Alice Springs.
03:21 And as we move into Sunday night, Monday morning, down as low as 1 degree in Alice Springs.
03:26 So the potential for frost extending into the Northern Territory as well as right across
03:31 the southeast.
03:33 And that's it for our weekend weather update.
03:35 As always, stay up to date with the latest forecasts and warnings on our website and
03:39 our app, and we'll see you again soon.
03:41 [Music]