THE Bureau of Meteorology has issued a cyclone watch, with a tropical low in the northwest Coral Sea expected to intensify into a cyclone in the next 24 hours.

The current watch zone spans from Coen to Cape Tribulation.

At 10am, the tropical low sustained winds near the centre of 55km/h with wind gusts to 85km/h hour.

The tropical low is estimated to be 570km northeast of Cooktown and 580km east northeast of Cape Melville.

It is moving west at 7km/h.

A cyclone is expected to cross the far north Queensland coast on Thursday.

OVERNIGHT: Queensland is expected to have another cyclone arrive on Thursday, with a low pressure system forming about 800km northwest of Cairns.

It comes as a second low has formed on the monsoon trough off Western Australia and a third major weather system has built near Vanuatu, the latter of no concern to Australia.

Weather Bureau forecaster Jess Carey said the most likely scenario for the low off Cape York was for it to reach cyclone strength on Thursday.

It would be a weak Category 1 and travel southwest, crossing Cape York somewhere north of Cairns.

After that it would probably turn south-southeast, eventually heading back out into the Coral Sea.

“It’s a bit far out to be sure,’’ Mr Carey said. “This will be our fourth cyclone for the season and it will be called either Nathan or Olwyn, depending on whether it or the one in the Indian Ocean forms first.’’

Mr Carey said it was likely that the bureau would be tracking the big tropical storm well into next week.

Substantial rain was expected from Cape York south to about Cardwell which would be welcome given large parts of the region and the Gulf of Carpentaria had missed out on summer rain.

Cruising into a storm Passenger films as cruise ship nears Cyclone Marcia. Courtesy YouTube/Emily Sho.

“I think there’s a lot of Queensland that would welcome rain,’’ he said. “Townsville has had only about a third of its average rainfall for summer.’’

Mr Carey said the cyclone developing in the Vanuata-Fiji region looked dangerous and was building into a major event.

It was expected to be named last night.

Originally published as It’s official: State is on cyclone watch