Australia

As they say in Tasmania, if you don't like the weather come back in five minutes. After Hobart experienced its warmest October on record, snow has returned to the state.

And more is on the way.

Temperature records tumbled in Tasmania during October as parts of the state experienced unprecedented mid-spring warmth.

Tasmania as a whole registered its second warmest October on record, with a statewide mean temperature that was close to 1.5 degrees above the long-term average. 

Both New Zealand and Australia will have mostly sunny weather on Thursday but conditions are going downhill in Aotearoa as a front and low moves in for Friday and the weekend.

By 7:30 on Monday morning it was already in the mid 30s in parts of Sydney. Today it's nearly 20 degrees cooler at the same time thanks to the "Southerly Buster" that moved through late Monday.

The colder air flow is due to a southerly from the Southern Ocean spreading into the southeast part of Australia and is affecting a number of major cities.

Sunday will be hotter than usual across many parts of New Zealand and Australia with centres in the South Island up to 10 degrees above normal.

WeatherWatch.co.nz says highs in the mid 20s are possible in Central Otago with low to mid 20s possible in many other areas, especially in the south, inland and east.

Perth is having its wettest October in six years and the wettest year to date since 2005.

Severe thunderstorms will strike Australia's eastern states and territories on Thursday.

A low pressure system and associated trough will trigger the multi-state storm outbreak, which will be made particularly intense in some areas by a mix of cold upper level air and wind shear (change in wind direction and speed with height).

Australians all lived through it, but the Bureau of Meteorology has made it official that September 2017 had some significantly hot days.

It was so significant that BOM released a statement for only the fourth time this year. 

A week or two ago this area was breaking heat records but this weekend it will be about the rain through some parts of New South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania.

With Australia breaking all sorts of heat records this year any rain will be hugely welcome by farmers, growers and fire officers concerned about the developing fire season.

Brisbane has been sweating through the hottest September day in about two decades, with temperatures close to breaking records set more than 70 years ago.

The city reached 37 degrees Celsius at 3:00pm Friday, the hottest September temperature recorded at Brisbane's current observation site, established 19 years ago.