Sydneysiders are set for yet another washout this weekend, but Adelaide will cop the worst of the wet weather – with the South Australian capital enduring a constant deluge over the coming days.
Weather forecasts have predicted rain for all capital cities at some stage this week, except for Darwin in the Northern Territory – which is likely to remain dry.
Sky News Australia Meteorologist Rob Sharpe expected about half of Australia’s land mass will see more than 5mm of rain this week.
Meanwhile in South Australia, Sharpe said Adelaide could see its wettest week in six months – with rain set to hit the city every day this week.
“It’s likely to target Queensland through the next few days, Thursday’s the peak of that,” Sharpe said during his forecast on Monday morning.
“Wednesday and Thursday look pretty soggy for the west and then at the end of the week we’ll have a north-west cloud band coming through into the south-east corner of the country, with significant wet weather attached to that as well.”
Although Sydney is in for another wet Saturday and Sunday, Sharpe anticipated less rain would fall than last weekend.
Nobbys Head at Newcastle experienced 35mm of rain last Saturday and Sunday, while other suburbs across greater Sydney were soaked with totals up to 70mm.
Sharpe said the impending rain is due to a north-west cloud band drifting across south-east of the country, which is tipped to target NSW on Sunday.
“With falls as a rule of thumb below 5mm for the NSW coastline… some forecast models, notably the AI models… are actually picking some totals as high as 10mm to 20mm in that same region between Sunday and Monday,” he said.
A high chance of showers is forecast all weekend for Melbourne, while a rainy Saturday and Sunday is predicted for Hobart, according to the Bureau of Meteorology.
Brisbane likely to see a wet Sunday, with the slight chance of a shower on Saturday, with rain expected all weekend in Canberra.
There is the possibility of showers in Perth on Saturday and Sunday, but most of the rain is tipped to land across the city between Wednesday to Friday.
Australia’s ski resorts – including mainly Perisher, Thredbo and Mt Buller – could also see more snow.
“In fact for many of the ski resorts, this will be the best week so far for the season in terms of the snow on the cards,” Sharpe explained.
Rain is on the cards for ski fields in the country’s south-east on Saturday, before snow will likely fall again from Sunday into Monday.
“For Mt Buller, my latest forecast is 25cm for this coming week, but if you included Monday as well, my forecast would be probably be closer to 38cm of snow,” Sharpe said.
“It’s looking pretty decent, however I must also flag, we’ve got rain likely to come through on Saturday rather than snow, so maybe another 20 or so millimeters of rain.”