Floods give way to heatwave in week of extremes

From torrential rain to heatwaves, humidity and more thunderstorms, Queensland will experience some major weather extremes this week. See the forecast.

From torrential rain to heatwaves, Queensland will experience weather extremes this week.

As the rain clears in the southern part of the state, North Queensland is expected to experience a significant heatwave, with the “feels like” temperatures soaring to 40C later this week.

Thunderstorms are likely across much of Central Queensland on Monday, spanning from the Warrego forecast district as far as the Capricornia coast and Wide Bay regions.Further afield, storms are possible across most of the state from the eastern reaches of the Channel Country to the Gold Coast and up to just south of Cooktown, as well as most of the Gulf Country.

It comes after the South East was inundated over the weekend with varying totals falls of over 100mm seen across corner of the state in the 24hrs to 9am on Sunday.

While the rain had eased in the south, the Bureau of Meteorology’s Danny Teece-Johnson said most of the South East corner could expect 1mm to 6mm rainfall on Monday.

“The clouds will be starting to clear on Monday,” he said.

“Tuesday will be a bit sunnier, so there could be a shower or two but only up to around the 5mm mark, and then Wednesday onwards mostly sunny, and we will see temperatures start to warm up to the high twenties and low thirties as well.”

Mr Teece-Johnson said thunderstorms would be possible about the Brisbane area from Wednesday, as humidity increases spurred by recent rainfall.

Youngs Crossing Rd was closed after flooding. Picture: Lyndon Mechielsen/Courier Mail

“There is certainly a chance of storms, probably in the afternoon, particularly Thursday and Friday, it will just depend on how humid it gets and how all those factors work together.”

Police Minister Mark Ryan said the government had received advice from dam operators that the dams were “holding up” during the wet weather.

⛈️Today's Storm Forecast 24/10⛈️
Severe storms w. large hail, damaging winds and heavy rain possible in central, southern & #SEQld today. Very dangerous severe storms w. giant hail possible in the #Capricornia. Warnings will be issued here: https://t.co/2C9mCV30o5pic.twitter.com/etJG0sFw7G

— Bureau of Meteorology, Queensland (@BOM_Qld) October 24, 2022

As the flood risk for Brisbane abated Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner raised concerns about how long it took for council warnings to be distributed to residents’ mobile phones on Saturday via the national alert system.

“A message was sent at 12.35pm – so just after lunchtime – and we have received reports that some people received it after 7pm at night,” Mr Schrinner said.

“So taking over six hours for them to receive an emergency alert is unacceptable.”

A motorhome was almost completely submerged at Goodar near Goondiwindi on Saturday.

He said almost 20,000 sandbags had been collected from council depots on Saturday, adding to the more than 50,000 that are already in the community.

“So there’s a lot of sandbags out there in the community.”

Felix Lightfoot from Bulimba enjoying the wet weather with Eli Bourne, Theo Bourne and Aksul Johansen at Bulimba Memorial Park on Sunday. Picture: Richard Walker

Mr Schrinner said the council was not aware of any homes that had flooded off the back of the heavy falls, but he warned “that could change quite quickly”.

“At this point in time, it’s been mainly flooded roads that we’ve been dealing with,” he said.

“There have been some SES jobs registered. There have been reports of leaky roofs.”

In the regions, an elderly couple were left trapped between two creeks southwest of Toowoomba on Sunday afternoon.

Queensland Fire and Emergency said the couple became trapped between two bodies of water on the Gore Highway north of Goondiwindi shortly before 1.30pm.

The rescue operation followed an incident on Saturday where a woman in her 70s and man in his 30s were taken to Goondiwindi Hospital after their motorhome was inundated by floodwaters.

BRISBANE Queensland