A closer look at where tropical Cyclone Alfred is tracking now as it heads towards the Queensland south coast
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00:00The latest Alfred track map from the Bureau of Meteorology was issued for 11 a.m. Queensland
00:08time, 12 p.m. New South Wales time.
00:11New update?
00:12Well, new delay.
00:13We're now likely to see it crossing the coast as a Category 2 system, but not until the
00:18early hours of Saturday morning.
00:20Still, we've got the same cyclone warnings in place from Double Island Point down to
00:25Grafton in New South Wales, though it doesn't include that city.
00:29You will see the winds really along the east coast extending quite a good ways to the south
00:36of the system.
00:37Now, we do have some warnings that have changed as well.
00:40The coastal hazards for parts of Queensland and New South Wales.
00:43Some areas now cancel.
00:46The area north from the coast, around about Gympie, up to the top of Garry, Fraser Island,
00:52now no longer under warnings.
00:54Same, same from the area just south of Nambucca Heads to just south of Foster, no longer under
00:59severe weather warnings for abnormally high tides and for some dangerous damaging surf
01:05that could cause coastal erosion.
01:07But those warnings remain in place right across that region, where we've also got warnings
01:12for damaging to destructive winds and for heavy to intense rainfall.
01:18That's likely to continue.
01:19The reason the ocean related warnings or the coastal warnings have been eased is because
01:23the system is now close enough to the coast that it's not creating those most dangerous
01:28swells.
01:29So hazardous surf still continues all the way up through the Garry coast and all the
01:34way down at the moment, potentially all the way down to Eden and tomorrow that retracts
01:38back towards the Sydney coast, but still very dangerous seas out there.
01:42We are seeing the system moving towards the coast, but at a much slower rate, and that
01:47means that even for those areas that are in the very western fringe of the system and
01:54are already experiencing some dangerous weather, it means it's going to last for longer.
01:58Damaging winds have been recorded, gusts pushing towards 100 kilometres an hour.
02:03Just for Moreton Cape this morning, 95 kilometre an hour gusts measured at Cape Byron.
02:09Heavy rainfall has been around too, we've seen hundreds of millimetres in parts of New
02:13South Wales, 180 millimetres plus in southern Queensland.
02:16Some minor flooding already this morning.
02:19As the day progresses, we're likely to see conditions rapidly deteriorating, particularly
02:24as we get into tonight for that part of the coast around Alfred.
02:27Now, the delay and any subsequent delays will just mean longer periods with those very windy,
02:32very wet conditions and that big surf damaging the coastline.
02:36In the coming days, we will see the system make a crossing, but it will be particularly
02:41slow moving as it does.
02:43It will weaken relatively quickly over the course of perhaps 10 hours after making first
02:48crossing over Moreton Island, but it will stay in the vicinity of Brisbane at this stage
02:53for quite some time.
02:54That means that we could see that coastal inundation from an elevated storm tide continuing
03:01for hours and likely including the high tide as well.
03:05Then once that system slips to the south and through New South Wales into Victoria, the
03:10rainfall is going to continue for some in the east coast of Queensland and northern
03:14New South Wales.
03:16That will slow the recession of any waters.
03:18We are expecting flooding, likely major flooding for some, hundreds of millimetres in a six-hour
03:25period potentially and certainly hundreds of millimetres day on day for several days
03:30for this region.
03:31So, flooding is a major concern.
03:33Flood watches remain current for all of the rivers in southeastern Queensland and northeastern
03:37New South Wales.
03:38It's just a little bit of a delay in what's going to be a very dangerous few days.