Victoria: Traditional Winter Westerly #1. July 25th - August 5th 2009.

US is increasing rainfall over southern and mountain VIC in it latest run. Fingers crossed it comes off.

Not looking that exciting today now. The band is pretty broken up so could easily find a gap.

Thursday into Friday is now holding interest. EC/JMA/GFS all have solid falls with that front and a rather sharp thermal trough (BTW wouldn't rule out a 20C on Thursday ahead of the front as we get strong warm air advection). EC has the change just before sunrise through central areas so seems to be slowing down.

Perhaps worth starting a new thread for next weekend/next week when it becomes clearer.

I think even start a new one for Friday as that has the potential to be the strongest front of the year.

If we can luck 20mm Friday morning that would make it one of the most productive sequnces in years.

A very springlike drizzle here with light rain in it. Diurnal heating kicking these showers off. Looking wet for the east this afternoon.

Has been drizzly in the CBD but only enough to dampen the footpath. About 0.1mm if I was to have a guess. Dewpoints are rather low away from the coast which will limit the totals, unfortunately.

Had to re format puter over weekend so I never got around to posting the most wicked hail shower in the early hours of the morning when that front pushed through...GOSH it was deafening!..heading up to Mt Buller this weekend so hopefull for some nice snowy experience in blizzard conditions most likely

For low dew points, the drizzle has been pretty thick and non stop here

No rain here yet but I do see a bit of a line of showers coming our way.

Nice Line forming in the west now on the radar. Been trying to spit on on off for the last 2 hours here, but nothing much in the way of success, thing we could be in for a wet one tonight tho.

For low dew points, the drizzle has been pretty thick and non stop here

Is starting to moisten up - dewpoints up 3-4C across much of Melbourne in the last ~2 hours. Still totals are taking there time to add up (0.6mm is pretty slow for Dunns Hill in drizzle).

Band looks quite impressive now.

Bet this front goes right below us once again, reckon we will miss this lot of rain again...

So it is....

Drenching showers in Sth Melbourne now for 30 mins..

Today's Tuesday

BTW nice shower moving through the CBD.

Few nice heavy showers up to 2mm here

Really solid rainfall around the region the last hour. I have had 5.8mm here and it is still coming down hard. I think areas to the south of me, literally 1-2km, have had closer to 8-9mm.

Still a bit to get through, so some suprises for some of us out of this system.

Nice to have another win!!!

Yeah hard to tell whats going on..in fact how come its raining? I thought it doesnt rain anymore??? Someone keeps putting water in my gauge, at least 200mm in recent times. Bizzaro world..

Would seem we have jumped to spring. Yet another "thundery" type change with a real kick from afternoon heating.

Some really heavy showers in the band just clearing the CBD which could well see the totals in the eastern burbs locally top 10mm - was expecting more like 2mm (and to tell the truth half expected to record less than 1mm in Ferny Creek).

Is nice to be surprised by rain - though let's not get to carried away - most of central Vic is still running on (about) decile 1 for the year to date. Bit of a miss for the models...

PS The system for Thursday/Friday is still looking promising.

Really thumping down again!!! It is a stunning system!

Anth, looks like maybe some local thunder heading your way. I heard a clap out to the SE earlier and thought it was a CG but hard to tell as I wasn't looking in that immediate direction. Def to my SE though. David out there in Endeavour Hills??

8.8mm here now and rising steadily.

I have noticed after being informed by John that EC has now resolved into a second wave of westerly winds for the next week which is the best outcome in this given environment. Every front that comes through at this time judging by todays has a chance of being invigorated by the diurnal heating.

Friday looks super wild, especially early on and would advice parking cars away from trees where possible!!!

Thanks for the tip Karl! Will definitely keep the car away from trees!

Getting really dark to the south of me, and heading my way - looks like it's going to drop it's guts over me - certainly not expecting this!

It is a nice, drop. I am up to close to what Karl has had at about 7mm so far. Looking at the forcast I expected the 1.5mm we had early afternoon to be a good result. Didn't expect this nice band which has set in for the last 1/2 - 3/4hr.

I have actually benn plesently surprised over the last few days. I was away for a couple of weeks and got back Saturday. But since then the forecasts and models have indicated not much, where in fact I had had probably 20mm since Sat. Which is way more than I expected. Very nice indeed.

I think a cumulonimbus past over me (was more to the north) (i was on the border of the rain...again) 10-20 minutes ago. Not much rain over here yet though.

Karl Lijnders wrote:so some suprises for some of us out of this system.

I was just suprised to get my forecast right... lol... I said this for today:

I think the far south could cop some locally heavy showers tomorrow morning in particular, chance of thunder,

Fantastic radar atm too for some spots - I think its a sign for a great storm season, well I think we will get a great one! .

Models still looking gorgeous for this Thur/Fri period and signs of the continued wet weather pattern continuing for a while yet.

Missed most of the 5mm here whilst on the train home. The gutters were certainly flowing when I was driving home from Box Hill.

Certainly exceeded my expectations that I had this morning.

Bring on Friday!

8.6mm here in Ferny Creek (just pipped by Dunns Hill which holds the top score on 10.2mm ATM). A BIG suprise and now on 20mm for the month of August.

Funny - with the benefit of hindsight - if you look at this morning's EC the upper trough was ahead of the surface trough with a small area of upper divergence moving into central Victoria in upsliding westerlies. Clearly - just enough to destabilise things which got a help on by the arvo's heating. Had it come through at night we might have got nothing

Friday's is also looking very promising - not huge totals - but a solid front with a very sharp thermal trough (so very dynamic).

I like that word Jake gorgeous its what I usually call my other half but now that you mentioned it like that yess it is looking rather gorgeous Friday mate hopefully another nice drop for most of us.

Was out in about Karls hood this afternoon and I can vouch what he said earlier it drizzled or rained from Forrest Hill to Knox city preety much the whole time with hardly any breaks perhaps 1 or 2 short ones at the most. Then my friend and I drove home we were hit by the band from the west heavy torrenical downpour with sheets of water on the road and water gushing from the gutters on the sides of the road half way down the Eastern freeway all the way to Hoddle Street & Royal park and the Zoo.. Once I got to Flemington racecourse again & Showgrounds the roads became vastly dry again and I thought typical! Anyway had a shower here at home around 530pm and another small one right now but that heavy rain through the Inner NE and N suburbs tonight in the car was the heaviest rain I have seen all year here in Melbourne.. To me it matched the rain rate of the storms of March 15th and the Early April thunderstorm was great to see