After a sweltering night, with Mildura experiencing its hottest night on record, the state is set to bake and when relief does come, it won't come to everyone.
Melbourne is on track to reach 37 degrees on Thursday but a cool change should hit the southern suburbs between 1pm and 2pm.
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Victoria, Melbourne set to swelter on Thursday
Northern parts of that state are in for the hottest conditions this week, with Mildura expected to get two days of 44 degrees on Thursday and Friday, dropping to 42 degrees on Saturday.
Senior meteorologist Claire Yeo from the Bureau of Meteorology's extreme weather desk said the change would be weak and slow moving.
"We are going to see relief in the southern suburbs in the early part of this afternoon, but because the change is quite slow moving and is not a very strong change, we are not going to see the relief in northern parts of Victoria, or even the northern suburbs of Melbourne, until late in the day," Ms Yeo said.
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The change that will breathe into the northern suburbs between mid-afternoon and 5pm is expected to be so weak it will not push across the Great Dividing Range, keeping temperatures high in the north of the state with warm overnight temperatures.
Heat Health warnings are issued for all northern sections of the state, including East Gippsland, Mallee, North Central, Northern Country, North East and Wimmera regions.
Mildura, on Wednesday night, had the warmest February minimum on record with 30.6 degrees, Ms Yeo said. Melbourne has twice had the same 30.6 degree overnight minimum, once in 2010 and also in 1902.
The hot winds kept Melbourne's overnight temperatures at 30 degrees and above for most of the night.
The temperature only dipped below 30 at 3.30am, to 29.9 degrees. The mercury continued to dribble down. At 7am it was still 27 degrees.
It was the hottest night in a month, with January 8 having had overnight temperatures hovering above 28 degrees.
"It was very hot and uncomfortable, and added into that mix is the humidity," Ms Yeo said.
"Although we are used to quite warm temperatures through summer we are not used to these kinds of humid conditions in Victoria," she said.
A total fire ban has been issued for northern and central Victoria, including Melbourne. https://t.co/X4greIyrt0 pic.twitter.com/pdmgEU0tzx
— 7 News Melbourne (@7NewsMelbourne) February 8, 2017
Bureau of Meteorology forecaster Dean Stewart said when the cool change hit the southern suburbs it would take about an hour to drop by about 10 degrees.
"It is expected to be a dry change with only a slight chance of a thundering shower," Mr Stewart said.
Ms Yeo said the rainfall over the weekend had taken some of the sting out of fire danger warnings. But with winds up to 70km/h and hot temperatures there were still severe fire danger warnings for the Mallee, Wimmera and Northern Country and very high to high fire danger warnings for the rest of the state.
Despite there being no days over 40 degrees for Melbourne this summer, the statistics have held their own. The mean temperature for January historically is 26 degrees, and the mean for this January held at 26.5 degrees.
Stormwater from rains on Sunday and Monday flushed into Port Phillip Bay, reducing water quality but the most recent Environment Protection Authority beach report lists all beaches as having good water quality and suitable for swimming.