‘Warm, bit sticky’: New Year’s weather forecast

From a significant ‘rain dumping’ and a cold snap on the Tablelands, to a sticky end of year, here are some of FNQ’s most memorable weather events of 2024. See the New Year’s forecast.

Brothers Jonty and Alby Rungan stay cool, playing in the shade at Muddy's Playground. Photo: Catherine Duffy

A little cloud cover won’t dampen New Year’s celebrations according to the Bureau of Meteorology.

Bureau community information officer Daniel Hayes said while there was a chance of showers toward the end of the week, Far North residents would ring in the new year in dry, if somewhat sticky, conditions.

“It’s still fairly warm, but... by the time we get to the new year it might be one or two degrees above (average),” Mr Hayes said.

Looking further ahead, there could be a damp start to 2025 with showers expected for most of the week, but large rainfall totals were not expected.

“We will have a chance of showers continuing of most of the week but dont expect much in them until Thursday when we start to see things pick up a bit,” he said.

Showers won’t dampen spirits as Far Northerners prepare for a slightly damp and very warm start to 2025. Picture: Brendan Radke

He said the showers were due to a trough moving inland and up the eastern coastline.

“There’s a trough flying through inland parts of the state generating some storm activity around the south-east and coast area at the moment so you’ve got a bit of an upper level trough bringing storms that way,” he said.

“The upper level assistance will gradually make its way north along the coast along Rockhampton and Mackay areas and Thursday into Friday we’ll begin to see shower and storm activity into Cairns and the north tropics.”

While showers were expected in Cairns towards the end of the week, Mr Hayes said the Tablelands might see some storm activity.

“The chance (of rain) will be there, but we haven’t seen much in the last week really, but there’s a chance of a shower here or there,” he said.

Brothers Jonty and Alby Rungan stay cool, playing in the shade at Muddy's Playground. Photo: Catherine Duffy

“Storms are more likely on the Tablelands, more so the western Tablelands, but on the coast, we’re less likely to see storms.”

Reflecting on the year that was, Mr Hayes said some of the standout weather events of 2024 was a “rain dumping” by Tropical Cyclone Kirrily after it crossed the coast at Townsville in January, and a widespread frost in the Tablelands in July.

“Tropical Cyclone Kirrily which came through in late January … we didn’t get a huge mount of rain out of it, but it had impact on road and rail lines, then it moved and hung around inland and managed to spread the love around quite well for a long period,” he said.

“The other one would be the cold outbreak in July that brought some widespread frost on the Tableland, and while it didn’t get as cold for us in Cairns, we had nice cool days and temperatures got into low single digits and even negatives.”

Originally published as ‘Warm, bit sticky’: New Year’s weather forecast