A POOL of cold air will spread over NSW this weekend, bringing some of the coldest weather so far this year and even a bit of snow.
April is typically the time of year when NSW starts to see big temperature swings.
Being the middle month of autumn, Australia is still surrounded by some of the warmest sea surface temperatures of the year.
This warm water acts to insulate the continent and helps keep the air temperature up.
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Right now, the water surrounding Australia is even warmer than usual, which is causing even more warmth than we would typically see in mid-autumn.
Last weekend, a tongue of hot air drifting over Tasmania caused Hobart to reach 32.3 degrees, which was the city's warmest April day on record.
However the warm air that lingers over Australia in April is in a constant battle with incursions of much colder air venturing up from the Southern Ocean, in the wake of cold fronts.
As autumn progresses into winter, these cold fronts gradually reach further north and the air behind them gets colder.
Two of these cold fronts will surge across south-eastern Australia towards the end of this week, bringing a pulse of cold weather that will bring a taste of winter to some parts of NSW.
The first front will be weak and clip the southern half of NSW on Friday into Saturday. The second front will be stronger, spreading over the state from Saturday night into Sunday.
The air behind this pair of fronts will be about 10 degrees cooler than the air ahead of them.
Condobolin is forecast to reach up to 31 degrees on Friday and just 20 degrees on Sunday, with the minimum temperature dropping to around 8 degrees by Sunday morning.
Wind chill will also exacerbate the wintry weather this weekend, with temperatures feeling several degrees colder than they are in areas exposed to stong winds.
Further south, temperatures will drop below zero in the NSW alps as the colder air sweeps in behind the fronts.
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