The Bureau of Meteorology had an “extreme heatwave warning” in place today for the remote Pilbara and Gascoyne areas of Australia’s largest state, warning temperatures there could hit high forties °Celsius over the weekend.

In the Pilbara mining town of Paraburdoo, about 1,500km north of the state capital Perth, a maximum temperature of 47°C was forecast today, more than 6°C above the average January maximum, according to forecaster data. It was 42.7°C there at 11am local time.

Australia’s highest temperature on record of 50.7°C was logged at the Pilbara’s Onslow Airport on Jan 13, 2022.

Today’s hot weather raises the risk of bushfires in an already high-risk fire season amid an El Nino weather pattern, which is typically associated with extreme events such as wildfires, cyclones, and droughts.

“Very hot and dry conditions combined with fresh southerly winds and a fresh to strong west to southwesterly sea breeze will lead to elevated fire dangers on Saturday,” the weather forecaster said on its website, regarding part of the Pilbara.

The warning comes after hundreds of firefighters battled an out-of-control bushfire near Perth earlier this month amid soaring temperatures, prompting evacuations.

Australia’s last two fire seasons have been subdued compared with the 2019-2020 “Black Summer” of bushfires that destroyed an area the size of Turkey, killed 33 people, three billion animals, and trillions of invertebrates.