‘At this stage it still does have a moderate chance of becoming a tropical cyclone today and into tomorrow.’

Areas of Far North Queensland have been warned of heavy rainfall and potential flooding as a low pressure system off the coast of Cairns threatens to develop into a tropical cyclone as early as Friday.

A low weather system, named tropical low 29U, sitting about 400km to the northeast of Cairns in the Coral Sea is expected to make landfall around the Innisfail area in the next 24 hours.

Senior meteorologist Jonathan How said the Bureau of Meteorology is expecting severe weather to start building as early as Friday morning.

“We are already seeing rain and storms building to the of Daintree and up towards Cooktown, and at this stage it still does have a moderate chance of becoming a tropical cyclone today and into tomorrow,” he said.

“We still do have a tropical cyclone watch current for communities between Cooktown to Palm Island, and this includes Port Douglas, Cairns, Innisfail and Palm Island itself.”

How said regardless of whether this system does develop into a tropical cyclone, impacts similar to a category one system — such as heavy rain and damaging winds — are still expected to impact the region.

If the system does develop into a tropical cyclone, it will likely be named Narelle or Owen.

Rain is expected to start building from Thursday afternoon and into the evening across the northeast tropical coast as the system draws closer towards the coast, including around Cairns and further south.

“We are expecting gale force winds to develop across the coast from early Friday morning and then extend through that cyclone watch area,” How said.

“We’ll also expect to see heavy rainfall as that system crosses the coast on Friday and this is likely to produce flash flooding as well as higher than normal tides which could exceed the highest tide of the year.”

The system is expected to also bring rainfall more broadly across the state, with heavy rain extending down as far south as Mackay and Rockhampton on Saturday.

On Sunday moderate to heavy falls could hit eastern parts of the state, later shifting towards the central and south-eastern parts of Queensland, with potential heavy falls around the Wide Bay and Brisbane area depending on how the system moves.

“Conditions do gradually ease up for northern Queensland later on the weekend and early next week but we are reminding residents that flooding issues could persist for quite some time and this heavy rainfall coming up could prolong existing flooding across the region,” How said.