After days of wild weather, damaging conditions will diminish, but the risk of large thunderstorms remains.

Residents of Queensland’s Wide Bay and surrounding land areas have been warned of the risk of severe thunderstorms with damaging winds and large hail on Saturday.

Bureau of Meteorology senior meteorologist Angus Hines said storms and showers were expected to linger along the rest of Australia’s east coast this weekend.

“The storm risk has disappeared for the hardest-hit areas,” he said.

“In relation to the storm activity expected on Saturday, there is still a risk to some parts of eastern and inland Queensland in general (but) it is not forecast to be as active or widespread as Friday’s storms .”

There was still a dangerous surf warning in place for parts of the New South Wales coastline and a risk of severe thunderstorms for parts of Queensland.

“If severe storms develop in these areas, the likely threats on Saturday will be damaging winds and large hail,” he said.

Western NSW, central Victoria and South Australia have been battered by damaging winds, heavy rain and large hailstones in recent days.

The storms prompted severe weather warnings, power outages and hundreds of calls to the state’s emergency services.

Late on Friday, BoM warned that severe thunderstorms with damaging winds would continue into the evening in parts of eastern NSW.

Residents were told to move their cars under cover, secure loose items around their homes and stay away from creeks and storm drains.

Hines said more than 500,000 lightning strikes have been reported across the country, with the vast majority over NSW and Victoria.

“Thunderstorms brought brief but heavy rainfall in many places on Friday,” he said. “In Victoria, Geelong was hit by heavy rainfall, with 69mm of rain falling during the day, but that included 50mm in 45 minutes as a heavy thunderstorm moved directly overhead.”

Extensive damage to cell towers between Buronga and Broken Hill in western NSW left more than 1,600 people powerless at one point, with some temporarily connected via backup generators.

Crowds heading to the MotoGP at Phillip Island, southeast of Melbourne, were told to reconsider their trip due to the wild conditions.

Showers were expected to develop from east Queensland to the Kimberley on Saturday afternoon before conditions settled, the bureau’s senior meteorologist Sarah Scully said.

Calmer, sunny conditions should occur on Sunday afternoon.