Sunnier conditions in NSW after torrential rain during the week

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Wild weather caused flash flooding in Sydney as well as two tornadoes. However, Miriam Bradbury from the Bureau of Meteorology says the weather is clearing up.

Transcript

00:00Thankfully for the east coast it will be a much more settled weekend ahead. For much

00:06of New South Wales including the Sydney area we are expecting sunny conditions across this

00:10weekend. A few showers about the far northeast of New South Wales spilling up into Queensland

00:15but really shouldn't put too much of a dent on the rain gauges. So all round the east

00:19coast should see a pretty settled weekend ahead.

00:21Good to know. Is it still the case though obviously beyond the weekend that we're expecting

00:25a wetter than average spring certainly in the country's east?

00:30That is still the case. So a higher than usual chance of seeing above average rainfall not

00:35just through the east but through much of central Australia as well. As we go out west that

00:39signal gets less certain but certainly it is looking likely we will see above average rainfall

00:44in the months ahead through those eastern areas.

00:46I wonder about the fire risk as well. I know a significant part of western Victoria was earmarked

00:52much recently as you know having a heightened fire risk into spring in the recent outlook

00:56for example. Are we expecting parts of regional Australia like that to remain quite dry into

01:02spring?

01:02Look for much of regional Victoria particularly those western areas there is still a greater

01:09than usual chance of above average rainfall. However I think the thing to remember is that

01:13rainfall isn't the only thing that determines whether or not fires are likely. We look at how

01:18wet the soils sorry how wet the fuels are. The fuel is basically what the fire has to burn

01:24and because we've had so little rainfall in those areas over such a long time the fuels

01:28are still reasonably dry even though we're looking at more rainfall than usual. So it's a little

01:32bit of a contradiction but really it's still something we do need to focus on. Across the spring

01:37and summer period in Australia fires are a risk even when we've got a wetter than usual outlook.

01:42Yeah that's why I wanted to ask because you know you don't want the rain to lead to this sense

01:45of complacency I guess. We've been talking a lot about the eastern seaboard but before

01:48I let you go what about in the west how are things looking for WA into spring?

01:53So we are looking at not particularly wet not particularly dry signal for the spring period.

01:59Certainly for this weekend we might see a little bit more wet weather with a cold front coming

02:02through but it's not convincing one way or the other as we go through the rest of spring.

02:06Good on you Miriam. Thank you very much. Miriam Bradbury joining us there from

02:10the Bureau of Meteorology with some positive news.

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