Another burst of heat has swept through southern areas of Australia during the 27 and 28 January 2025.
Generally, the brief burst of heat was at its most intense across inland New South Wales and Victoria although some of this made its way into Southern Victoria including Melbourne.
While not regarded as a heatwave, the brief burst of heat resulted in maximum daytime temperatures reaching 40C for many areas including Melbourne City prior to the arrival of the southerly or south westerly wind change.
For Victoria, the highest maximum daytime temperatures for Monday 27 January included:
- Ballarat - 37.8C.
- Castlemaine - 39.5C
- Geelong - 40.5C.
- Melbourne Tullamarine Airport - 41.2C.
- Hopetoun - 43.7C.
- Mildura - 43.9C.
It is interesting to note that this level of heat did not filter fully into the northeast region of Victoria and thus maximum daytime temperatures across this part of Victoria were slightly lower than forecast.
Across parts of the inland regions of New South Wales, maximum daytime temperatures soared above 44C including:
- Ivanhoe - 44.1C.
- Tibooburra - 44.6C.
- Wilcannia -- 45.6C.
Maximum temperatures of 40C to 43C were widespread across the west of the state.
Closer to the coast, maximum daytime temperatures were cooler but it did reach 39C at Penrith on Monday afternoon and between 36C and 38C across other areas of Western Sydney.
Afternoon storms Monday 27 January 2025
My wife and I traveled back from Batemans Bay via Bungonia during Monday afternoon where maximum temperatures generally hovered around 29C to 33C depending on location.
During the afternoon, we were identifying isolated to very isolated cumulonimbus cloud towers developing near Marulan and Bundanoon, The cloud towers were struggling to develop due to the lack of moisture and the dry northwest winds prevailing. They were producing very localised showers as we found out when we drove underneath one of these north of Marulan. We encountered no hail.
Another isolated thunderstorm cell was noted to the north of Sydney late afternoon which was separate from the developing cells to the south.
Close to sunset, a thunderstorm like squall line had developed south of Sydney which tracked north eastward. A few small shower and minor thunderstorm cells developed around Blacktown with this system. Generally, moderate showers fell with all cells clearing after sunset.
The main squall like event was accompanied with wind gusts 50 to 83 km/h including two peak wind gusts of 83 km/h at Holsworthy (Defense) at 6.54 pm and again at 7 pm. Rainfall was mostly light although a few rainfall figures do standout from the event including:
- Canterbury - 17 mm.
- Bowral - 20 mm.
- Goulburn (Gundowringa located northwest of Goulburn being a rural locality) - 38 mm.
Tuesday 28 January 2025
On Tuesday, the heat contracted further east ahead of a southerly change moving north along the New South Wales coastline. As such, enough time existed to allow maximum daytime temperatures reach into the low 40s across the whole of Western Sydney making Tuesday 28 January 2025 the hottest day of the summer. Maximum temperatures for the day included:
- Horsley Park - 42C.
- Bankstown - 42.3C.
- Penrith - 42.5C.
- Sydney Airport - 42.5C.
- Badgerys Creek - 43.3C.
Only the extreme coastal areas were spared from this heat due to weak sea breezes.
This occurred prior to the arrival of the southerly buster.
Maximum daytime temperatures at other locations included:
- Moruya - 33.8C at 8.30 am with the cool change arriving shortly after. Thus by 10 am, it was only 23.8C.
- Nowra - 38.6C (Before the arrival of the southerly change).
- Cessnock - 40.1C.
- Lake Macquarie - 40.6C.
Southerly buster
The cool change has ended the two day heat event across southern Australia. As the change passed over Sydney between 3 pm and 4 pm, it felt more like a southerly buster. The intense heat was replaced with maritime air as hot northwest winds gave way to strong to gale force south easterly winds. A sharp temperature drop was felt across the wind change.
I was outside photographing strong cumulo - congestus cloud which developed into isolated thunderstorm cloud towers with such development clearly enhanced by the wind change.
As such, isolated thunderstorms developed on the wind change which spread northwards to the Hunter Valley. The images attached to the post are part of the weather system as the change progressed late afternoon. All photos were taken around Blacktown or Doonside. No storm chase was initiated given that the change coincided with peak hour traffic which would have made any worthwhile chase futile. In this situation, I used local vantage points to document the passage of the wind change and the associated thunderstorm development.
All photos were taken using my Nikon 3200 DSLR camera.