Cold weather front to follow Easter bunny into region

The Easter bunny will bring more than chocolate eggs to the South West this long weekend with the first significant front of the season expected to hit tomorrow.

Weather conditions are not looking ideal for those planning on camping over the Easter weekend with cold temperatures, rain and possibly even hail expected.

Bureau of Meteorology duty forecaster Jim Richardson said the first big front of the season would bring wintry conditions to the South West.

“The main sort of player in the weather for the South West this weekend is that we’re going to see a front approach on Thursday night and that will push through into Friday morning,” Mr Richardson said.

“With that we’re going to see pretty widespread rainfall, the chance of a storm as well and probably pretty windy sort of conditions, as well as some hail and some wind warnings for the coastal areas.

“From Saturday onwards, it starts to clear up a little bit but probably still some shower activity around in the far South West.

“Into Sunday it clears up, the front is way out of WA by that point but we’ve just got a very cool air mass behind it, so we’ll probably see some frost around parts of the Great Southern.”

For Bunbury and coastal areas in the region, minimum temperatures are predicted to be between 7C and 10C and rainfall will set in tomorrow with 10ml to 25ml expected.

It comes as winds reached up to 56km/h in Bunbury this week – proving summer is well and truly over.

The cooler weather did not put Bunbury teenagers Mac Deruwe and Ewan Douglas off from taking to the Back Beach during school holidays this week, with the mates wanting to make the most of big swells on Tuesday.