What this weekend’s weather will bring to Melbourne
Melbourne woke up to the smell of smoke and a thin blanket of ash on Saturday as firefighters battled more than 30 active fires moving through the state.
More than 115 homes and buildings have been destroyed by fires in Victoria, but emergency officials warned the figures were conservative and more homes would be confirmed lost in the coming days.
Fire officials estimate more than 300,000 hectares of land were blackened across the state during the heatwave, and there were reports of ash coming out of open gates from various areas across the metro area, from the reservoir to Croydon and even the CBD.
“Smoke from the fires has reached New Zealand,” Bureau meteorologist Daniel Sherwin-Simpson said.
“It will be pretty high in the atmosphere, so I doubt that will cause any air quality issues for them. But they will be aware of the haze in the sky today and probably into the future, depending on how the fires progress.”
Sherwin-Simpson said the visibility meter at the airport in Horsham, which measures horizontal visibility in a given area, can usually see up to 40 to 50 kilometers away.
Due to the fires near Natimuk on Friday evening, visibility dropped to 1500 meters.
“It was pretty smoky outside,” weather bureau meteorologist Daniel Sherwin-Simpson told this imprint. “There was a lot of smoke in that area from the Natimuk fire.”
“There’s quite a bit of dust clouds around at the moment. This morning I noticed there was more dust than smoke. I think it rained a tiny bit and that took a lot of dust with it, but because there wasn’t a lot of rain it couldn’t be washed away properly.”
“The same situation existed at Melbourne Airport, but it is difficult to say whether it was dust or smoke. Visibility dropped to approximately 5500 meters at 21.30 on Friday night. Ballarat also received a lot of smoke from the Skipton fire.
“We saw a large portion of the state covered in smoke. It passed over the city, but it was pretty high up, which brought us those gloomy orange skies.”
Sherwin-Simpson warned that although the smell of smoke had already reached Melbourne, it would worsen across the state tomorrow as a new high pressure system moves in.
“Yesterday [Friday]We saw the low pressure system that brought warm air and windy conditions but lifted the smoke into the atmosphere, so it wasn’t too bad over the city. However, as we head into Sunday we will see a broad ridge of high pressure move across the state.
“Once this moves it will be calmer, but that can trap smoke. We may see it move a little further across the state and accumulate in the valleys. But that depends on how the fires go today.”
He said smoke will likely drift north of the fires, affecting air quality in those areas more than others.
In Melbourne, which is taking a break from the severe heatwave that has hit the CBD this week, the highest temperature on Saturday will reach 25 degrees, with a low of 15 degrees on Saturday night. Temperatures are expected to reach 30 degrees in the fire-ravaged Longwood area, but conditions remain hazy.
A Melbourne-based reader who spoke to this masthead from her home early Saturday morning said she noticed ash coming into her bathroom from the exhaust fan above.
“I didn’t expect this at Suburban Reservoir,” he said. “This morning, I threw open the doors and windows to welcome that nice 20-degree breeze, until I realized the weather wasn’t all that nice. The wind blowing at my front door smelled of smoke, so I quickly closed everything again.”
“Even though all the doors and windows are closed, there is a smell of smoke in my house. It is definitely not clean. I just heard someone walking on the street coughing.”
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