Tropical Cyclone Outlook for Coral Sea

Issued at 4:23 pm EST on Wednesday 4 January 2023
for the period until midnight EST Saturday 7 January 2023.

Existing Cyclones in the Eastern Region:

Nil.

Potential Cyclones:

There are currently no significant tropical lows in the region. A surge in the monsoon is expected to move into the northwest Coral Sea on Thursday and Friday. A tropical low is likely to form offshore from the Townsville region on Friday enhancing wind and rainfall near the coast south of the centre. However, the low will then move to the southeast away from the Queensland coast. The likelihood of it developing further into a tropical cyclone increases only slightly to be low on the weekend well away from the Queensland coast before it moves out of the Australian region east of 160E by Monday or Tuesday.

Likelihood of this being a tropical cyclone in the Eastern Region on:

Thursday:

Very Low

Friday:

Very Low

Saturday:

Low

There are no other significant tropical lows in the region and none are expected to develop over the next seven days

Thursday:

Very Low

Friday:

Very Low

Saturday:

Very Low

NOTES: The likelihood is an estimate of the chance of each system being a tropical cyclone in the Region for each day.

Very Low:

less than 5%

Low:

5% to 20%

Moderate:

20 to 50%

High:

Over 50%

The area of coverage for this outlook is the Coral Sea and northern Tasman Sea west of 160E.

Further information on Tropical Cyclones is available at www.bom.gov.au/weather/cyclone/