26/05/2008: Coastal districts of South Australia have been drenched by heavy showers and storms today, and Adelaide is in the firing line this evening, according to weatherzone.com.au.

Parawa picked up 28mm in the six hours between 9am and 3pm, with most of that falling between midday and 3pm. This has made it their wettest day in five months and wettest May day since 2004.

Cummins, on Eyre Peninsula, received 18mm in the same time period, including 11mm in 10 minutes between 12:05pm and 12:15pm. This was also their heaviest rain in five months.

"A slow moving trough of low pressure is combining with high levels of moisture and an approaching wave of colder air in the upper atmosphere to trigger these heavy showers and storms," weatherzone.com.au meteorologist Matt Pearce said.

"The upper level winds that are steering these storms are quite light, so they have been fairly slow moving. This is allowing some pretty high rainfall totals to build up."

The main area of rain and thunderstorms will move over Adelaide over the next few hours, leading to widespread falls of 10 to 20 millimetres across the metropolitan area. Locally higher falls of up to 50mm are possible.

A Road Weather Alert has been issued for Adelaide warning of the potential for flash flooding from these storms.

"The trough will move away to the east tomorrow, so we are likely to see showers and storms easing through the morning and mostly clearing by the afternoon," Pearce said.

Media Inquiries:

Matt Pearce
media@weatherzone.com.au
02 9965 9236

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