Tropical Cyclone Narelle projected to tear through Aussie states as communities prep for prolonged nasty weather
Tropical Cyclone Narelle is gaining steam over the Coral Sea as communities across vast swathes of Australian states are on full alert.
A tropical cyclone is bearing down on the Australian mainland.
Tropical Cyclone Narelle is expected to make landfall in Far North Queensland early on Friday morning before moving into the Northern Territory and out towards Western Australia, where it will dissipate on Monday.
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“Since being named, it has strengthened further and is currently a category 2 system located in the northern Coral Sea, around 1100km to the northeast of Cairns and around 1000km off the coast of Cooktown,” Mr How said.
“It is currently producing sustained winds of around 110km/h at its centre, with gusts of 155km/h, and it is moving in a westerly direction.”
“Ahead of this crossing, a tropical cyclone watch has been issued for communities between Lockhart River and Port Douglas and then also inland. This does include Cohen, Cooktown and Wudjal Wudjal.”
Narelle is expected to develop into a category 4 system as it crosses the coast over Cape Melville on Friday morning and maintain intensity as it heads over the Cape York Peninsula.
The cyclone will then cross over the Gulf of Carpentaria, where Mr How says it has the potential to “strengthen again” before it makes its second landfall over the Northern Territory, which has already experienced severe flooding this month.
“We can expect gale-force winds within the next 24 hours. At this stage, gale to damaging winds will start from around Thursday morning. We’ll see gusts of 120km/h, initially between Lockhart River and Cape Melville, and then extending southward to Port Douglas by Thursday afternoon and into Thursday night,” Mr How said.
“We could see very destructive wind gusts of more than 200km/h near the centre of the system as it does cross the coast. Winds of this strength do have the ability to cause significant damage to property, vehicles, trees and power lines.
“We could even see some pockets of heavy falls all the way down to Cairns. The heaviest rain is expected near the tropical cyclone’s crossing on Friday.
“Six-hourly rainfall rates are likely to exceed 100 to 150mm an hour. This will produce dangerous flash flooding and rapid river rises, and we do have a flood watch current for much of northern Queensland.”
Large tides and dangerous coastal storm surges are also expected.
More to come...
