A HEATWAVE bringing hot and dry conditions across Queensland may be dissipating but the scorching temperatures have only just begun.
A warmer-than-average summer for most of the country has been tipped by Bureau of Meteorology forecasters, delivered on the back of one of Australia’s hottest springs.
Hot days are predicted without much reprieve after sundown, with the bureau predicting warmer-than-average nights across most of Australia as “very likely”.
A bureau spokesperson said an interplay of natural drivers like the El Nino-Southern Oscillation, a positive Indian Ocean Dipole and rising global air and ocean temperatures was influencing Australian climate patterns.
This year, Australia experienced its driest September on record.
A hot and dry heatwave delivered very high and severe to catastrophic fire dangers across Queensland during the last week of November.
Firefighters battled up to 240 fires last weekend alone, with a bushfire at North Stradbroke sparked by lightning five days ago ongoing.
A fire ban has been extended across all of Redland City until 11.59pm on Wednesday, December 5.
