If Thursday hits its predicted peak it will be the ACT's longest March heat spell on record.

A severe storm is expected to narrowly miss Canberra on Monday afternoon.

Sydneysiders look set for a soggy commute to end the working week, as an intense low pressure system off the coast delivers widespread showers, wind and large and powerful surf conditions to the city.

Canberrans still wringing themselves out from the wettest June on record shouldn't put away their gumboots just yet.

Sydneysiders can expect several days of rain-soaked commutes after an early morning downpour ended three weeks of uninterrupted sunshine.

It will snow in the ACT tonight as a cold front moves over the region, the Bureau of Meteorology says.

Temperatures in Canberra reached 38.5 degrees as the region's first heatwave of the year peaked on Wednesday.

Sydney in for scorching weather on Friday as a slow-moving high-pressure system steers a huge hot air mass formed over Australia's Red Centre to the country's south-east.

A fierce blast of winter has prompted a severe weather warning for most of southern NSW, including Sydney.

Global temperature records continue to tumble, with August easily the hottest in 124 years of data, Japan's Meteorological Agency says.

Unless you've been inside a 200kmh blast of wind it's hard to imagine the tremendous natural force behind it.

The trough that brought a series of storms to Canberra on Saturday is expected to affect the region until Monday.

Coogee Beach looked like a construction site - or a popular holiday destination for heavy machinery - as 12 large earth movers, two vacuum trucks and a crew of 35 worked to restore the beach to its pre-storm glory.

A powerful cold front is set to bring 'dangerous' conditions to large parts of south-eastern Australia in coming days and send temperatures plummeting in Sydney.

Electricity demand surged to its highest in Sydney and the rest of the state for the summer as a burst of inland heat sent the mercury into the low 40s in the city's west.

Melbourne could be hit with floods this week as recent rainfall puts pressure on catchments at capacity.

Three days of heavy rain in mid-April were enough to make it Sydney's wettest autumn in 12 years but conditions have largely dried up since.

Monday morning's grey drizzly skies will usher in a warmer than average work week, before a turn for the chilly on Friday.

A high-pressure system "as big as Australia" could bring Sydney's warmest patch of weather since April, while most of the country will go for a week with little rain.

The impacts of the monster El Nino in the Pacific are likely to intensify across much of Australia, including worsening drought and an elevated bushfire threat, after conditions that were nullifying its effects suddenly retreated.

Sydney sweated through its hottest December night in 15 years overnight, but a cool change - and a good drenching - is on its way.

Prepare for hotter days and a worsening drought - a ''substantial'' El Nino event is underway.

A high-pressure system "as big as Australia" will bring Melbourne's warmest patch of weather in more than five months, while most of the country is likely to go for a week with little rain.

It was the near miss that went viral after a lightning bolt got strikingly close to a Qantas jet mid-air. A few months later and it has happened again.

It was a day which saw tops of 39.2 degrees in the city and 40.7 in the west, and ended dramatically with severe thunderstorm warnings across the west.