The Bureau of Meteorology issued frost warnings for parts of Victoria and South Australia on Thursday as a cold west-to-southwesterly airstream settled over the south-east, with damaging winds due in southern Tasmania overnight and snow falling to 300 metres.
The Victorian frost warning, issued at 10:58am, forecasts temperatures down to minus 1 degree on Friday morning across the Northern Country, North East and East Gippsland. A separate frost warning is current for South Australia's Mid North. Both sit behind the cold front that crossed the south-east on Wednesday, and the Bureau said it would issue no further warnings for the Victorian event.
The sharpest warning is in Tasmania. A severe weather warning for damaging winds, re-issued at 10:41am, covers far southern Tasmania including Dover, with winds averaging 60 to 70km/h and peak gusts near 100km/h from late Thursday afternoon into early Friday. It was the only severe weather warning current anywhere in the country, and its footprint had narrowed overnight from a broader area to the far south alone.
Behind the front, showers are falling as snow above 400 metres in western and southern Tasmania, lowering to 300 metres in the far south, and above 800 metres in Victoria, on state forecasts the Bureau issued at 4am Thursday. Sheep graziers warnings are current for the Tasmanian Midlands and South East and for the New South Wales Central Tablelands, Southern Tablelands and Snowy Mountains, where cold, showers and westerly winds put lambs and off-shears sheep at risk.
Flooding from earlier in the month is winding down. The Bureau carries a final flood warning for the Kiewa River in Victoria and a final flood watch for the Moore and Hill River catchments in Western Australia, both signalling water receding.
The damaging-wind window for Tasmania runs from late Thursday to early Friday, easing as high pressure builds behind the front. The frost risk peaks on Friday morning, and alpine snow levels then lift over the weekend, to 1000 metres on Friday and 1500 metres by Saturday, as the outbreak eases. The Bureau will update its warnings through Thursday afternoon.
