Sydney has recorded its hottest August day since 1995 as parts of Australia swelter through a warm and windy end to winter, and what is almost certain to be the country’s hottest August on record.
The city’s official weather station at Observatory Hill recorded a maximum of 30.3C at 2.48pm. The city’s overall record August temperature set in 1995 was 31.3C.
Hot and windy conditions were forecast for Sydney on Friday and temperatures in the mid-20s forecast for the weekend.
Brisbane reached a high of 29.8C at midday, with higher temperatures of 32C predicted on Saturday, 34C on Sunday and Monday. Miriam Bradbury, a senior meteorologist at the Bureau of Meteorology, said these temperatures were well above the city’s August average of about 23C.
Preliminary August records have already been broken in Queensland on Friday with Longreach recording 37.7C, Birdsville 39.5C and Mount Isa airport 36.6C, as well as in New South Wales, with Bourke reaching 36.9C and Sydney airport 31.6C.
Weekend winds
On Friday afternoon the bureau issued a severe weather warning for damaging winds over the weekend in the south-east as three powerful cold fronts move through South Australia, Victoria, Tasmania and New South Wales.
The BoM meteorologist Jonathan How said the combination of wind and heat in eastern NSW meant high fire danger for Sydney and the Illawarra through the weekend.
In south-east South Australia, western Victoria and western Tasmania, How said, winds were expected to ease Friday afternoon and then re-intensify later in the evening as the first cold front moved through.
The second cold front would extend the strong to damaging winds to the rest of Tasmania, Victoria and south-east NSW on Saturday, along with showers and rain, he said.
On Sunday the strongest cold front was expected to bring widespread damaging winds across the four states, along with rain, thunderstorms, hail and snow down to low levels.
How said the cold front would ease off Monday.
The BoM also issued a coastal hazard warning for parts of southern Victoria, and a flood watch across much of Tasmania.
A warm winter into a warm spring
The bureau’s preliminary results for winter indicated Australia’s mean temperature was about 1.5C above the 1961 to 1990 winter average.
“Despite some typically cool winter temperatures at times on the east coast, winter has been warmer than usual across the country, with August on track to be Australia’s warmest August on record,” the bureau said.
It is forecasting above-average heat to continue for most of Australia throughout spring, as well as above-average rainfall for much of the east coast.
Most of Queensland, NSW and the ACT should expect more rain than usual from September to November.
Drier-than-average conditions were forecast for Western Australia.
The northern wet season starts in October but the first significant rains were forecast to fall earlier than usual in Queensland and part of the Top End – but later in most of WA.
With Australian Associated Press
