Australian Severe Storms, Weather Events and Storm Chasing

[Michael Bath]

All models have been tipping yet another ECL to form off the NSW coast - most likely bombing overnight Tuesday.  Heavy rains and gales are again likely along the NSW coast south of the Hunter and also Northeast Victoria.

There's certainly a good chance of snow later on Wednesday for parts of the Central and Northern Tablelands. TWC model indicates some snow into Thursday as well but further north to the Queensland border.  Of course this depends on where and when the next ECL develops.

Interesting to see the NSW BoM have a mention on snow for the tablelands later Wednesday.

Michael

[Michael Bath]

Latest (12z) model output suggest the coastal trough will develop two low pressure areas today - one off the North Coast and another off the South Coast. The southern low will dominate and deepen rapidly during Wednesday before weakening and edging northeast on Thursday.

Looks like it is going to be very wet and windy in Sydney and south if this scenario comes off ! TWC has the low centred ON Sydney tomorrow evening.

Meanwhile, the cold pool will move through Victoria and NSW bringing the chance of snowfalls to the Central and Northern tablelands, and possibly to the Granite Belt of Southeast Queensland. Non-alpine snow appears likely from Wednesday afternoon onwards.

Of course, the ski fields should do very well from this system.

[SnowMac]

Hi Michael and All 

Again sleet possible on the granite belt and in the forecast for Toowoomba!!

TWC model is impressive for the NT and Granite belt with 530 over the Northern Tablelands. Pretty amazing this month has been so far.

[Jeff Brislane]

I would judge by the current observations that snow is falling along the highest parts of the Central Tablelands as I type. Temp at Orange is just above 2 with precip falling so it's likely there will be snow there as well by morning. Tomorrow looks very promising for good acumulations of snow down to about 1100 meters as long as the air aloft stays very cold as is forcast. Initially the BoM were thinking that warmer air brought in by the low would be a problem but it's looking more likely that the lows position could be favourable for the whole Tablelands.

Jeff.

[Jimmy Deguara]

Yes Jeff,

It is touch and go for tomorrow. However, if i was able to, I think heading out there would be a good move. It is a during the week chase and there is plenty of moisture there. Currently, I can only see good snow falls in the region on the higher peaks of the Central Tablelands and possibly some on the higher peaks further north. The southern ranges of course is the pick for me - we'll be hearing from that region of course.

Regards,

Jimmy Deguara

[Jimmy Deguara]

Not much has changed from the 00Z GFS data to the 12Z data. It seems there is potential for late rain in Sydney as the cloud swirls around the western end of the low pressure system.

Regards,

Jimmy Deguara

[Michael Bath]

Latest TWC output has cold enough air on the Northern Tablelands from about now till Thursday afternoon for snow on the higher ground. 700hPA RH suggests a precipitation max will arrive late morning Thursday from the southwest so it will be interesting to see if much snow can fall during the day - really depends if the air warms too much. A couple of cm is likely tonight so could end up with a decent cover in some places. At this stage it looks good for overcast conditions all day Thursday.

I will head up tomorrow morning once I check the morning model output and satpics.

btw - ended up with 32mm from this system in 24 hours 8pm Mon to 8pm Tues, on top of the 19mm over the weekend.

[Jimmy Deguara]

Had a chat with Nick Moir and he confirms it was snowing quite heavily at Oberon at the time 3pm. Shooters Hill had some snow showers earlier also.

Nick will post pics once he has the chance. He will remain there overnight.

Regards,

Jimmy Deguara

[John Allen]

Well for the first day in a long while weve had nonstop rainfall all day. Total at my place since 9am is 23mm, and an addition 6mm last night. Over in Gipsland from the progression of several of these systems the system is saturated: and rainfall totals in excess of 140mm last night with a further 40-50mm today. Such rainfall has basically put all Gipsland on flood warning: 4 rivers are on major flood, the rest moderate, and continuing to rapidly rise. Catchments had 50mm up to 9am this morning, with more during the day, which will help the water situation a bit. Unfortunately the system didnt penetrate to the truly parched areas such as bendigo, although its effect in weakening the dominant high will mean this part of the state should get some rain with the next couple of fronts expected to be coming through friday night and sunday.

[nmoir]

has been snowing steadily since about 1pm in oberon with heavier falls around shooters hill and black springs , a vid from me will be up on smh.com.au soon and i will link it when its up , and here are a couple of pix from this arvo. currently it has stopped snowing but hoping i will be a big white blanket for me tomorrow as i am staying at the "big trout" in oberon

all pix are (c) 2007 Nick Moir , The Sydney Morning Herald and are for viewing only on this site

[nmoir]

here is the news story with video link , i shot most of this in oberon , but the pine tree bits are from near shooters hill , 20km sth
Snow fell creating some amazing pictures in the NSW town of Oberon.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/a-winter-wonderland/2007/06/27/1182623992497.html

and some shots taken around oberon and also some stuff by Brendan Esposito in Crookwell

http://www.smh.com.au/photogallery/2007/06/27/1182623987762.html

[David Brodrick]

NPWS rangers report it is snowing on Mt Kaputar at the moment. We might go up for a look this arvo and get some photos.

Cheers,
  Dave

[Michael Bath]

Left home at 9am after my morning work and arrived Tenterfield just after 11am. Drizzle had set in about 30km northeast of town and the temp had fallen to about 4.5C in town.  Decided it was worth a quick look at Mt McKenzie 9km southwest of Tenterfield. Snowflakes started with the temp just under 3C and elevation about 1100m (summit is 1280m). I didn't stick around as the higher ground to the south was more favourable today and it was already late morning.

Proceeded south along the New England Highway with continuous precipitation occurring. Temp varied between 3.5 and 4.5 most of the way to Glen Innes where some sleet started to fall. There was no sign of the earlier snowfalls in Glen Innes.

Drove the 30ks or so south to the Ben Lomond area where light snow was covering the higher ground. Along Inn Road was the best of the snow with a 2-3cm accumulation over the accessible ground. Snow set in from this time (12.30pm) and continued for the next 1.5 hours while I was in the area. Temp was now varying between 1 to 1.5C.







I had a look around Ben Lomond village where the snow cover was becoming patchy. The falling snow was getting pretty wet by this stage but still beautiful to see.





Could not stick around to see what the evening would bring, but had a great day on the tablelands !

[David Brodrick]

Great photos Michael. We near froze our hands off trying to build a snow man - whoever built the one in your photo did very very well!

Here's our photos from today. In places the snow depth exceeded 10cm on Mt Kaputar.
http://narrabriweather.net/events/Snow09June2007.html

Regards,
  Dave

[Michael Bath]

Terrific photos of the latest snow event David and Scott. As soon as I saw the early satpics and the Narrabri obs yesterday morning, I thought Kaputar would be in for another treat. Glad you were able to verify this.

One day I'd love to see the snow there but I guess that is unlikely given how long it takes to get there from here and the short lead time to be sure there will be a decent fall.  Might just have to plan a bushwalking trip there in mid winter and get lucky !

Yes - your hands soon freeze with snow play. Fortunately the kids at that house had done the work already.

Michael