risk of Severe to Extreme heatwave conditions. Temperatures are currently forecast to reach 45 degrees in every mainland state and territory except the ACT next week. Some places will probably see December heat records broken, with Australia's December record of 49.5 degrees a chance of being exceeded.

Image: Forecast surface temperature on Thursday, December 19th.

A number of forecast models suggest that temperatures may exceed 50 degrees at some point next week. At this stage, the area most likely to near 50 degrees would be in the northwest of South Australia or southeast interior of Western Australia mid-to-late next week, although this may change in the coming days. The Bureau of Meteorology has forecast a maximum temperature of 49 degrees at Oak Valley on Wednesday.

Australia's highest maximum temperature on record(Strabane) (Amendment) Order (Northern Ireland) 1997 (S.R. 1997 No. 34)
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