Southern Europe has been under a variety of severe weather warnings this week owing to widely unsettled conditions driven by an area of low pressure in the region. This area of low pressure – previously a part of the system that brought colder conditions to swathes of the UK earlier this week – moved southwards across Europe through the middle of the week.
In doing so, it brought a cold front across western and central parts of Europe, with spells of rain and hill snow across the Alps on Wednesday, followed by snow showers on a brisk north-westerly wind. By Friday morning, accumulations of 20-40cm were expected above 600 metres, and with 60-100cm above 1,000 metres in the Swiss Alps.
The centre of the low-pressure system became established in the Adriatic Sea through Thursday and brought sharp and thundery showers, lashings of rain, sleet and hill snow and strong winds through the day to the surrounding nations. Croatia was one of the more adversely affected countries in the region where 15-50cm of widespread heavy snowfall in the Gospić region was forecast, alongside the risk of blizzard conditions and snowdrifts in association with strong north-easterly winds.
At the time of writing, the strongest gust of near-70mph was recorded at Rijeka international airport, probably produced by a cold, dense katabatic wind called the bora wind. While conditions were expected to ease through Friday, weather warnings will remain in place across Croatia and Slovenia owing to the continued influence of the bora winds with peak gusts of up to 100mph forecast by their respective national weather agencies.
On the other side of the globe, much of the northern half of Australia has been feeling the affects of Cyclone Narelle over the past week. Narelle formed in the south-west Pacific Ocean on the 15 March and quickly strengthened into a category 4 storm on the Saffir Simpson Scale, with gusts of more than 165mph off the coast of Queensland. Since making landfall the following day, Narelle has attempted a rare circumnavigation of Australia by traversing the entire northern coast of the country, before re-emerging over open water in the Indian Ocean on Tuesday.
Tropical cyclone landfalls are not uncommon for either coast of Australia, but the last storm to survive the trip from east to west was Cyclone Steve in 2000. Narelle re-intensified to category 4 strength on Thursday as it turned southwards towards the North West Cape of Australia. The last leg of the storm’s tour of the nation will come on Friday as it moves inland through Western Australia near the territory’s capital, Perth.
