A lingering monsoon low could deliver a year’s worth of rain in a week to parts of inland South Australia, Queensland and New South Wales, just weeks after record-breaking heat, with a high risk of flash flooding.
The Bureau of Meteorology has issued severe weather warnings for several regions on Tuesday – north-western NSW, central and northern parts of Victoria, north-east SA, and south-western Queensland – with heavy, locally intense rainfall predicted.
Places in north-eastern SA and north-western NSW were expected to receive between 200-300mm of rain over coming days, according to the BoM with widespread falls of 100-200mm across inland areas.
Sign up: AU Breaking News email
Further thunderstorms with the potential for heavy rain and flash flooding had the potential to occur through central Victoria, including Melbourne, on Tuesday.
Those were “some big numbers in a very dry part of the country”, said Dean Narramore, a senior meteorologist with the bureau.
Outback towns like Marree, about 600km north of Adelaide, could receive more than its average annual rainfall (142mm). The heavy falls came off the back of a “very dry year” with just 37mm recorded throughout 2025, and weeks after Marree’s residents sweltered through five consecutive days of at least 48C.
Communities like Tibooburra and areas north of Broken Hill in NSW and Birdsville in Queensland could also see significant falls after the bureau issued a severe weather warning for heavy, locally intense rainfall.
Separately, several days of showers were forecast for Sydney from late Wednesday to Sunday, with February usually one of the city’s wettest months.
The Indian Pacific, a tourist train operating between Perth and Sydney, has been turned around and sent back to Perth, after heavy rain and flooding washed away sections of track up to 100m.
An alert on the website warned: “There is potential that there will be impacts to services from Sydney in the coming week – we will know over the coming days, and our team is currently communicating with impacted guests and making alternative travel arrangements where required.”
The Australian Rail Track Corporation said its crews were inspecting the East West rail line near Broken Hill and Port Augusta to determine the extent of the damage, although repairs could take more than a week.
“Another further significant weather system is forecast to move across similar areas later this week, which may exacerbate existing damage and recovery efforts.”
Several outback roads, including the Birdsville Track, were closed on Monday.
Heavy rain and flooding was expected to cause more disruptions in coming days, Narramore said, and could even isolate some communities – however it was also filling up aquifers, rainwater tanks and dams.
There was also heavy rain falling directly over Kati Thanda-Lake Eyre, he said, which would also receive much of the water flowing from surrounding areas. The lake could be pretty full by next week, he said.
Elsewhere, Scone in the NSW Hunter region recorded 102.6mm at the airport on Sunday, setting a new record for the highest daily rain in February.
Global heating, driven mainly by the burning of fossil fuels, has increased the frequency and severity of extreme weather events.
