A weak monsoon trough with two embedded tropical lows has formed north of the Australian mainland and is likely to remain near the north coast over the coming days, the Bureau of Meteorology confirmed today.

"Monsoonal rainfall is likely to be confined to the near-coastal strip."

Other climate models also suggest the rain will be confined to the northern Top End and miss Katherine out.

If a tropical cyclone forms as a result of the trough, it would too far west of the NT to provide any weather influence.

"As with all monsoon events, there will be preferred regions for heavy rainfall, and these will be strongly influenced by the location and strength of any tropical lows which develop along the trough," the bureau said.

"At this early stage, there are indications that the tropical low currently sitting to the north of the Northern Territory will develop slowly and track westwards over the next few days.

"Once in the Timor Sea, later this week, the risk of this system developing to tropical cyclone intensity increases.

"This will create a hazardous situation for fishing, transport and other vessels on the Arafura and Timor Seas this week."

The bureau said at this late stage of the wet season, monsoon troughs generally do not move too far south of Australia's northern coastline.

"That is the primary reason why the current forecast extent of heavy rainfall across northern Australia is less than might be expected earlier in the wet season.

"However, because monsoon troughs which develop this late in the wet season don't spend as much time over the Australian landmass, any tropical lows which form are likely to spend much of their lifetime over open water.

"This increases the likelihood of them strengthening into a tropical cyclone.

"This is why tropical cyclone numbers in the Australian region are relatively high throughout March and April despite being late in the wet season."

April marks the final month of Australia's northern wet season, from October 1 to April 30.

To date, the 2018/19 wet season has delivered a mixed bag of rainfall across northern Australia.

Much of tropical Queensland has seen above-average rainfall, and even major flooding in the interior, due to the passage of tropical lows and cyclones.

The western half of the Australian tropics has recorded rainfall totals well below the long-term average; this includes nearly all of the Northern Territory and the vast majority of northern Western Australia.

"With only one month to go, it is highly unlikely that the current monsoon episode will significantly alleviate the current rainfall deficiencies over northern Australia, although some coastal locations may improve somewhat."

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