Sydney faces a high fire danger day on Friday, with a top temperature of 30 degrees expected to combine with the return of damaging winds.

A heart burst is forecast for suburbs across the NSW capital heading into the first full weekend of spring.

The NSW Rural Fire Service has declared a high fire danger across Sydney and Wollongong.

It comes as another surge of powerful winds is forecast to spread across Australia’s south-eastern states, prompting warnings for damaging wind gusts in parts of Victoria, NSW and the ACT.

Another surge of powerful #winds will spread across Australia’s southeastern states over the next two days, prompting warnings for damaging #windgusts in parts of #Victoria, #NSW and the #ACT.https://t.co/qT2jWEhjtc

— Weatherzone (@weatherzone) September 5, 2024

Weatherzone reported that a “vigorous” north-westerly airstream and embedded cold fronts would cause damaging winds, rain and thunderstorms over south-eastern Australia on Friday.

“While this system won’t be as strong as the event that impacted Australia’s south-east last weekend, it will still be dangerous in several states,” the forecaster said.

Damaging wind gusts were expected to develop in some areas of Victoria on Thursday night before becoming more widespread over southern, central and eastern Victoria on Friday.

The risk of damaging winds will also extend up through parts of southern and central NSW on Friday, including parts of the ACT and the Blue Mountains.

Weatherzone said a band of rain and embedded thunderstorms would spread across south-eastern Australia ahead of Saturday.

“Any thunderstorms that form in this period will have a risk of causing sudden damaging wind gusts,” it said.

“Tasmania will also cop another surge of blustery winds and squally rainfall as the front sweeps across the state on Friday.

“This rain will be falling into already saturated catchments, so further river level rises and minor flooding are likely from late Friday into Saturday.”

A flood watch has been issued for parts of Tasmania.

Wind would ease from Friday afternoon into Saturday as a high pressure ridge built across south-eastern Australia, Weatherzone said.

However, there will be another round of strong and potentially damaging winds on Sunday with the arrival of another cold front.

Queensland prepares

Friday’s day of danger in NSW comes as Queensland also readies for worse-than-usual bushfire conditions in coming months.

Aerial fleet have arrived in Bundaberg and Townsville just days into spring.

“We are already starting to see fire activity and we are keeping a close eye on conditions,” Rural Fire Service Queensland chief officer Ben Millington said on Friday.

A 10,000-litre large air tanker will be based in Bundaberg for spring and summer, to be sent to coastal and inland areas.

Bundaberg will also be the base for a Eurocopter and a waterbombing Blackhawk to support the state’s firefighting service and volunteers. Other aircraft are on standby at Townsville Airport.

Queensland has contracted an aerial fleet of 13 aircraft with a total waterbombing capacity of more than 32,000 litres.

There are also 150 aircraft on-call if required.

“The aerial firefighting response fleet … delivers an extra layer of support for firefighters and peace-of-mind for Queenslanders,” Fire and Disaster Recovery Minister Nikki Boyd said.

Millington said the aerial fleet provided significant support to ground crews, especially as fire activity increased.

It follows the stark seasonal bushfire outlook for spring, which found the unseasonal rainfall in Queensland in recent months had increased fuel loads and fire risks.

Parched grasslands caused by winter frosts and dry winds have driven an increased fire risk in southern and central Queensland, the forecast by national fire and emergency services council AFAC said.

“The biggest risk this bushfire season is expected to be grass fires, which have the potential to spread quickly in the significant fuel loads built up over the past two years due to rainfall,” Millington said.

With hot conditions forecast to continue through spring, Queenslanders are warned to prepare now.

-with AAP