56.0
Coconut Is Qld
51.0 Channel Point NT
49.0 Kununurra AP WA
49.0 Tindal NT |
Former
Tropical Cyclone Steve, which formed off Cairns in the early hours
of Sunday 27 February, went out with a bang today after completing a near
circuit of the continent. For a fortnight, the cyclone tracked across northern
Australia and around WA's northwest coast, bringing flooding across the
whole Australian tropics, before taking a shortcut across central southern
WA last Friday and entering the Great Australian Bight on Saturday evening,
still packing a punch with galeforce winds, torrential rain, and a central
pressure of 993hPa. On Sunday and Monday, the ex TC maintained intensity
while moving southeast, picked up a passing Southern Ocean trough last night,
and surfed under Tasmania this morning bring brief storm force winds
as its associated front crossed the island. The AWS on the summit of Mt
Wellington recorded a peak gust of 133km/h at 5am, with a 10 minute
average windspeed of 98km/h. At Maatsuyker Island, off Tasmania's
south coast, the barometer rose 11.1hPa between 6am and noon, an unusually
large rise for this time of year.
A thunderstorm which moved NE with a cool
change across the lower Hunter Valley, NSW, this evening dropped
49mm on the Newcastle suburb of Rankin Park in less than one hour.
Newcastle's Nobbys Signal Station recorded 19mm in about the same
time. The storm continued northeast between Dungog and Bulahdelah, with
radar images showing it maintaining rainfall rates above 40mm/hour for
over an hour.
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as
new and corrected information becomes available, with updates underlined