The Australian Weather Forum

The rainfall forecast for this trough and front is only up to 5mm inland areas and up to 10mm for Melbourne and surrounds Mon/tuesday.
http://www.bom.gov.au/fwo/IDY00030.201109180600.png" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
There is significant thunderstorm activity along the coast on this front on WA along the coastline atm. Maybe that will emerge for coastal SA and VIC as the front passes.?
BOM has no thunderstorm warning out atm
The wind map indicates the impact is stronger around Adelaide and surrounds tomorrow morning from 7-10am , arriving in the west of VIC at 4pm
and has lost impetus by 10pm.

Adelaide and surrounds looks particularly extreme as this front passes ,as they wake up tomorrow morning
EDIT: I particularly like the strong arc in the jetstream associated with this front . It is the steepest ascent and decent of polar jet stream air ,over distance ,l have seen this year.
( wunderground jetstream map)

This is about all I came away with yesterday on my 600km bust chase. Haha. Well it was a nice day for a drive at least.

Taken around 5:30pm Looking NE from Wimmera Highway just outside of horsha,


The turned around and the sun was poking through. I had no storms, so i just created a stormy looking atmosphere. Some may think its a tad 'overcooked' but i think its not half bad. Lol

nice rikki nice. Tomorrow is about timing of the change but I think that high pressure ridge will push the bulk of the good bits through bass straight again. grrr.

Once again it's the moisture in question generally for tomorrow. Here is our thunderstorm forecast for tomorrow, click link in signature for the chart:

Thunderstorm Forecast - Day 1 (Monday)
Issued 10:00 PM EST 18/09/2011

A cold front is expected to reach western Victoria during the afternoon to be located near Cape Otway at about 4pm-5pm, then central districts during the evening and far east overnight. Once again similar to most recently Saturday, the atmospheric environment is in question for whether or not any thunderstorm activity can form. The potential is there, however once again it is whether or not the moisture is available to support developement. Heating, and thus instability and convective potential is considered to be relatively fine however. Therefore, there is only the chance of isolated thunderstorm development during the afternoon and evening across the areas marked on the map below. The area of focus will be just ahead of and with the cold front, and this is where the majority of development takes place if any. In regards to this, damaging winds could be associated with any thunderstorms that develop in the vicinity of the cold front. However it is also worth to mention that there will be a tight isobaric gradient across Victoria during the day, so damaging winds are possible in general. The shear profile indicates that a fairly healthy thunderstorm cycle should eventuate if there is any development.

Upped the winds.

Severe Weather Warning
for damaging winds
for people in the South West, North Central, Wimmera, Central, West and South Gippsland, East Gippsland and North East forecast districts

Issued at 9:49 pm EST on Sunday 18 September 2011.
Weather Situation

A strong cold front will cross the Bight to reach western Victoria Monday afternoon, central Victoria Monday evening then extend to the far east by early Tuesday morning.

Locally damaging winds developing from the west on Monday ahead of the cold front then easing following its passage. Winds have the potential to averaging 50-65 km/h with peak gusts around 100 km/h over parts of the South West, North Central, Wimmera, Central, West and South Gippsland, East Gippsland and North East forecast districts. Regions above about 500m elevation may experience average winds up to 80km/h with gusts to 120 km/h.

The State Emergency Service advises that people should:

Move vehicles under cover or away from trees.
Secure or put away loose items around your house, yard and balcony.
Keep clear of fallen power lines.

The next warning will be issued by 11:00 pm EST Sunday.

Nice photos Rikki. All the canola around the place looks great atm. I dream of one day intercepting a storm moving over one of those fields, would make a great photo.

I'm thinking of going SW coast tomorrow as I think it will be a bit like Saturday but better, will see how things look tomorrow.

Huge upgrade in the models for rain tomorrow night. Thunderstorms will only be isolated and not really much of a feature of the day, but rain will develop in the colder air just behind the front as more moisture becomes available. This is a really strong spring cold front coming our way, strong to gale force winds, very tight temp gradient and an active system. Not sure about the 29C, it certainly is feasible but OCF has temps between 26C and 28C over the metro area, no sign of a 29C really. Maybe around Geelong it will get right up there not sure about the city though.

Today was 2C cooler than forecast across Melbourne, I always thought the BOM forecast looked a little high for temps and it still does for the cooler days in the outlook with OCF going closer to the mid teens than high teens for some of those days.

Looks like a classic Spring equinox front today. Reminds me of Sept 2007 & 2009. Unfortunately not much in the way of substantial rain totals - maybe 10mm.

Strong northerly will ensure no rain for us here, not until the colder air arrives at least, so could be showery tomorrow. Getting a bit excited at prospects for later this month, in about 10 days time though!

Temp gague in the car was reading 7 degrees when I left home this morning at 10 to 7. By the time I got to about Surrey Hills 1/2 an hour later, it was reading 17 degrees! The northerley is certainly pushing through some warm temps very quickly

Very warm and windy this morning with temps at 23C and rising fast. Might crack 30C.

Fairly useful band of rain and thunder tonight. Could be upwards of 20mm in it for local areas and maybe more on the ranges. Lots of wind about and high hayfever weather!

Good morning all,
the air certainly has a warm spring feel to it this morning. I wouldn't be surprised if we reached 29 here at work.

Could certainly do with some rain out this side of town, the garden is getting very dry & we haven't had decent rain for quite a while. Will have to start using the tank if we don't get anything decent soon.

1-5mm for the Melbourne area Tonight with the front itself (closer to 1mm here) could be the odd local fall closer to 10mm in the Eastern suburbs. Melbourne Catchments may get 10-15mm with the band Tonight.

By the Way Nick it was exactly this day 19th September in 2006 that Melbourne got 30.1c so to be the earliest early season hot temp it will have to pass that Today, at this stage I can't see it happening but you never know... I think 30% of being 27c, 40% of being 28c & 30% of being 29c in the CBD Today.

Nothing today because I have the day off. BOM says change for melb 7-9pm, perfect timing for stormies.

It has hit a tropical 26.0C here with 60% humidity. Conditions calm and stable for the moment which will no doubt be different when the band comes through tonight. I will keep the updates happening from my patch!

nice and hot outside... 28C when I last checked!!

Very blustery outside, hoping that storms develop this afternoon and evening as predicted

With an RH of 6 - 7% in the Northern Mallee atm, my hopes are not that high for much precipitation this evening.

Humidity is really low today 25% here and 26deg temp.