Extreme fire danger and damaging winds for the south-east

The Bureau of Meteorology has issued a severe weather warning as heatwave conditions hit parts of the east coast.

Transcript

00:00hello sarah here from the bureau with a severe weather update on the hot and windy conditions

00:05that are developing across southeastern parts of the country bringing elevated fire dangers and

00:10damaging winds to some so let's see what is driving these hot and windy conditions

00:16so here we've got this cold front and a trough with these hot dry and gusty northwesterly winds

00:23ahead of it bringing maximum temperatures of 34 degrees for both adelaide and melbourne 27 degrees

00:29for hobart and those winds are expected to peak across the tasmania area however the elevated fire

00:37dangers are expected to peak across the mainland where we do have a fire weather warning that is

00:43current with extreme fire dangers across large parts of southeastern south australia excluding the

00:48adelaide area but including the mount lofty ranges and then for victoria including the wimmera mallee

00:55and northern country fire districts now any fires that get going within these orange areas will be

01:02very difficult to control and farmers who are harvesting are being encouraged to postpone any

01:09paddock work for today so we also have a severe weather warning for those damaging winds so wind

01:15gusts in excess of 100 kilometers per hour throughout central and northeastern parts of tasmania so winds

01:22of this strength have the potential to bring down trees power lines cause power outages create hazardous

01:28driving conditions but they are expected to ease through central parts later this afternoon but will

01:34be a little bit longer to ease throughout the northeast and that will be later this evening

01:40so let's see that front crossing moving across it's due to move through hobart at around

01:454pm this afternoon adelaide 5pm while for melbourne 7pm this evening now it's going to be melbourne that

01:53will see the sharpest temperatures drop in fact 10 to 15 degrees dropped within an hour of that front

01:59moving through now also worth noticing is that you can't see any or not much shower or storm activity with

02:07regards to the rainfall however looking at the thunderstorm outlook thunderstorms are actually possible across

02:14south eastern parts of south australia western and central parts of victoria as well so this is in

02:20indicating that these are dry thunderstorms with dry lightning now the concern with dry lightning is

02:26that they can ignite new fires and in particular across the wimmera where this dry lightning is possible

02:32and it coincides where those extreme fire dangers are occurring today now as we move in to tomorrow

02:40that cold front is actually expected to weaken and skirt out into the tasman sea with this trough and

02:46the heat lingering across northern parts of victoria with these gusty northwesterly winds starting to build

02:52across new south wales and because of that we have elevated fire dangers that continue across northern

02:59parts of victoria but extend tomorrow into southern parts of new south wales as well

03:05now moving through from friday afternoon and into saturday that's when we have a strong cold front

03:12that crosses the southeast for victoria and tasmania bringing a much colder air mass behind it but

03:17significantly it pushes that trough northwards with those elevated fire dangers expected to move into

03:24eastern inland and northern parts of new south wales now this includes the sydney metro and the illawarra

03:31shoalhaven districts where fire weather warnings are likely to be issued for these districts on friday

03:39so it's going to be a hot and windy day across southeastern parts of the country now's a good time

03:44to stay up to date with our latest forecasts and warnings via the bureau website app and social media

03:49otherwise we'll see you again next time bye for now