Victoria: Early Spring Heatwave for southeast

Quite an interesting outlook period.

A weak wind change should move from the west tomorrow afternoon, late, and with the right conditions at hand, there could be a local thundery shower over the southwest, but not promising that. Temperatures will warm quite a bit tomorrow with the strong northwest flow becoming established, before shifting tempalarily west to northwesterly following the weak change. Overnight the winds will turn northwest again and strengthen ahead of the next cold front approaching Saturday, moving into western regions of the state at night. Isolated showers and thunderstorms should initially develop ahead of the change, before increasing a little to patchy rain over the southwest overnight, gradually becoming thicker and crossing the state as a band during Sunday; then isolated showers to follow. Could potentially see isolated thunderstorms develop over the east of the state during the day ahead of the system as temperatures will be high enough to produce instability.

And further out, as Karl says above, (beating me to it again mate), a few unstable periods possibly developing around Thursday, more thunderstorms developing.

Just quickly, I really think this storm season is going to be superb...

Well, the obvious warm day potential is for Saturday but IMO there will be plenty of cloud around through the middle of the day with high middle level moisture in the progs. This could put a serious cap on temperatures but I would expect at least 23C in Melbourne regardless. If we get some sunny periods 26C is a reasonable bet. In fact tomorrow could easily end up warmer than Saturday with a much sunnier day on the cards.

Saturday night will be very warm and increasingly humid as the rain band approaches and after that cooler and drier air gradually moves in. Should be a very substantial rain band covering most of the state through Sunday in fact it will be more 'rain areas' as the BOM forecast suggests. With the cold air coming in behind very warm and humid air and rain I wouldn't be surprised to be under heavy mist here for most of Sunday afternoon and evening.

I think the temp forecasts of 25-26C for Saturday is fair but may need assessment if this cloudband or showers develop on the backedge of this front tomorrow. I have said the chance of a shower or two developing but I am not sure. Assessment starts tomorrow.

The next week holds some traditional classic spring weather with sun and rain mix!!

Severe Weather Warning
for damaging winds
for people in the Alpine Areas, Western and Central forecast districts.

Issued at 10:51 pm EST on Thursday 10 September 2009.
Weather Situation

A cold front will move from the Bight towards Victoria late Friday, before sliding away to the southeast.


Damaging winds averaging 50 km/h with peak gusts around 100 km/h are forecast to develop on Friday for the Alpine Areas forecast district and parts of the Western and Central forecast districts.

Almost calm up in the hills this morning with a temperature of 3.1C and a light frost east of Tylden. Came down out of the hills and into a very gusty N-NE from Sunbury and all the way across the plains into Melbourne.

Not much wind to report in the Dandenongs this morning. As expected the temperature bottomed early and rose from about midnight and was ~8C by 6am.

Looking at LAPS NW Vic should crack 30C today and get into the low 30s tomorrow. Melbourne should also make the mid 20s tomorrow with a 1000hPa temperature of ~26C at 4pm (this would indicate up to 28C is a chance which would smash the early season record ).

Pretty mild and windy this morning. Plenty of sunshine however.

Latest US and NO GAPS has 10-20mm locally Sunday. Looks convective too.

Mt William got a gust of 104kmh!!!! Roof here in Abbotsford is rattling & shaking already...

What the hell is going on!!!! Melbourne Airport has already had a gust of 100kph!!! Bit of cloud coming in, but 25 looks good.

Why is it so windy when the Pressure is still relatively high????

I think the large temp variation between night and day might be causing a Katibatic effect & is playing a part? When winds rolls of the ranges much stronger than its supposed too being 'tunnled' Or 'Squeased' through the Melbourne plains fom the ranges to its North cos its not making much sense to me why winds have suddenly eased towards the West.. Geelong, Avalon, Laverton way all have sustained winds between 15 to 20 knots now there after having winds up to 40 knots earlier this morning

Looks less and less likely be 23c here in Melbourne today even my 22c may struggle abit the cold start and now the cloud factor may put a cap on things. Its 2pm and hasn't reached 20c yet.

Apart from tomorrow I don't see anything unsual about this for Melbourne is/was never going to be a heat thing for Melbourne it was always marginal as it was pointed out few days ago it looked more a Northern Vic and Eastern Vic extreme temp thing. I've seen temps reach 25/26c in August in Melbourne quite a few times so 20-22c in Mid September I don't find anything unsual about. If tomorrow gets to 27c then I might look at it differently. Of course like I said its a different story for up North I'm sure many areas in NW Vic will get to 30c and above during this period.

I am far from being an expert, but some rather interesting cloud coming over here now, seems to suggest a minor squal coming over or something. Anyone able to explain the cloud moving over the eastern suburbs at the moment?

Hmm not that warm today, thought the Mallee is near the 30's. The wind is disgusting. It seems we get more wind than rain these days. Tomorrow will be warmer but I don't think it will be too bad for Melbourne. Sunday is looking interesting. What are peoples predictions for totals on Sunday? Perhaps 5mm+?

LAPS has 20-40mm across parts of southern VIC, but I would suggest 5-15mm through Melbourne looks reasonable with the chance of thunderstorms.

A few storms off the coast, but mostly dry ones. Chance of a thundery shower in Melbourne this evening as winds moderate and shift NW.

Very windy here 'again" . sounds like a branch hit a car on Boronia road, not sure if wind or traffic.

Well scattered squalls across W and N Melbourne extending into the bay and out to the east in the next 30 minutes of 45-55 knots. Surely a lot more wind that forecast.

Hate to see this tomorrow!!

Jason, I think you'll find that it's a standing wave generated from the mid level winds coming down from the NW and being squeezed as Johnoo explained...maybe 3 spots, but yes, windy!!

Yes and getting windier as the cloud clears and the upper level temps increase a fraction and translate to warmer weather on the surface. A temp spike of 22-23C in the western suburbs about 4pm resulted in winds increasing to 100kmh in parts.

Chance of a brief thundery shower tonight and at first tomorrow but becoming probably a little more windier tomorrow.

Had a wind gust of 70kph here.

Driving through the Docklands I saw people holding on to traffic poles. The wind gets ferocious there as it gets funnelled between the buildings.

Horizon looks orange/pink from here. wonder if thats dust.

Christ on a bike, that last gust of wind was ridiculous, worst for the day. I wouldn't be surprised if that was dust on the horizon. It's getting bad out there. A dust storm wouldn't shock me at all

Australis(Shell3155) wrote:Horizon looks orange/pink from here. wonder if thats dust.

Wind has really picked up here in the last hour or so. Is horrible out there ATM.

Mildura's 31.3C is the stand out number (close to a record) and tomorrow should be up a notch or two. Also terrible fire danger ratings up there - well into the extreme for most of the day with very low humidities.

There is some seriously hot air across the border a long way south - including 35C at Port Augusta. That air will be sit over the north of Vic tomorrow so its going to get very very warm.

BTW bit of mid level instability around overnight into tomorrow morning. This should drop the odd spinkle though mostly virga. Would not rule out the odd stray bolt from some of the convection. EC actually has a top fall of 4mm for Ferny Creek so might be in luck up here

Hate to say it but some of the models are back peddling on Sundays rain - EC/JMA is down to 5-10mm and UK is less than 5mm. LAPS, GASP and GFS still bring through a significant event. Will have to see what the next model run brings but I'm not having good vibes

I must say that I am not surprised with the back pedal in the models, however I think 5-10mm is still a good result. Depends on how much convective activty there is within the frontal system.

Very windy weather currently, may take a while to die down a tad. Just had our first power flicker!! That hardly happens here!!

Looking good still beyond this period into next week with further spring fronts

BTW 115kmh winds up high around DJ so yeah it is a little breezy on the hill!!!