A taste of springlike warmth will offer Sydneysiders a reprieve from its frigid winter weather early next week after parts of NSW woke to conditions colder than Antarctica on the weekend’s winter solstice.
Monday will see a high of 22 degrees, the Bureau of Meteorology forecasts, as a burst of warm air moving east across the continent drives June temperatures 5 degrees above average before the winds of winter return from Tuesday.
Beachgoers enjoy the winter sun at Balmoral.Credit: Edwina Pickles
The warm day comes after towns across NSW ushered in Saturday’s winter solstice with their coldest morning in years. Canberra recorded a pre-dawn temperature of -7.6 degrees, its coldest June morning in 39 years.
Forbes shivered through a low of -5.5 degrees, the coldest June morning there in 27 years, and Cowra had its coldest dawn in a decade at -3.1 degrees.
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Goulburn and Cooma even out-iced Antarctica, hitting respective lows of -10 and -8.6 degrees on Saturday morning and offering residents a taste of what it’s like to wake up within the polar circle: Antarctica’s Davis Station clocked -8.4 degrees at the same time, according to Weatherzone.
The frosty snap was caused by a high-pressure system parked over south-east Australia, keeping a dry and cold air mass over inland NSW.
The winter solstice marks the day of the year with the shortest daylight hours (9 hours and 54 minutes for Sydney) which contributed to the frosty morning.
“We’ve had clear skies, light winds, and at the moment the nights are longest, which means we can really lose heat overnight,” bureau meteorologist Gabrielle Woodhouse said.
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