Thunderstorms and heavy downpours are expected to continue in Queensland as the state braces for more dangerous conditions amid a tiresome flood clean-up.
Severe storms rolled in on Wednesday night in the state’s southeast, with more wild weather predicted for coastal areas.
The insane weather could bring large hail, damaging winds and heavy rainfall.
Meteorologist Helen Kirkup told NCA NewsWire that the storms could trigger flash flooding, with downpours of 30 to 60mm.
“What we are expecting to see this afternoon is a fairly strong southerly change coming up the coast,” she said.
“We could see some of those storms develop into more dangerous storms and possibly getting either large hail, damaging winds or heavy rainfall.”
The storms are expected to stretch hundreds of kilometres from Mackay down to northern NSW.
The Bureau of Meteorology said the Sunshine Coast and Tweed regions were most at risk.
The slowly moving storm cluster in the north tropical coast has sparked severe weather warnings for Port Douglas, Daintree Village, Wujal Wujal, Mossman and Julatten.
“Severe thunderstorms are likely to produce heavy rainfall that may lead to flash flooding in the warning area over the next several hours,” the bureau warned.
The warnings follow the state battling more than a year’s worth of rain in just three days last week.
The unstable air mass threatens to unravel the tiresome efforts of thousands of volunteers who put their hands up to battle against the flood aftermath.
Australian Defence Force Major-General Jake Ellwood warned that recovery could take “years”.
“This will be done over time,” he said of the clean-up operation, where more than 1200 ADF personnel are assisting in Queensland.
Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk labelled the long string of weather events as “catastrophic” in a press conference last week.
“This is a serious situation and these are unprecedented times. I’ve lived in Brisbane essentially all of my life and I haven’t seen storms and floods like this all being thrown at xjmtzywus at once.”
The Premier urged Queensland residents to constantly monitor updates, describing the long weather event as “unprecedented times”.
“Everyone, please listen to the alerts,” she said.
