It was a raging John Daly who whipped up a storm on Friday at the Australian PGA Championship in Coolum - on Saturday the real thing struck as lightning forced organisers to suspend play.

Thirty-eight of the 62 players completed their third rounds.

The rest of the field will return at 7am local time Sunday to finish their third rounds with officials using a two-tee format for the final round.

West Australian Jarrod Moseley was leading by two shots at 16 under after 10 holes when the lightning suspended play at 2.53pm local time.

Play had been been interrupted for 10 minutes by a tropical shower but it was a storm brewing around Mt Coolum which prompted Tour officials to call players from the course.

"It was a good decision and a credit to the PGA," said 30-year-old Moseley, who held a two shot lead over his playing partner and two-time Australian Open champion, Aaron Baddeley.

It was the only decision the PGA Tour could have made.

But it was poor timing for Greg Norman, who was launching one of his familiar Saturday afternoon attacks on his rivals.

Norman, who started his third round with a bogey and then had eight straight pars, finally got his putter working on the back nine before play was suspended.

The Shark birdied three consecutive holes and had picked up his fourth birdie through the toughest stretch of the course at the long par 3 14th hole before his momentum was halted.

Moseley and Baddeley engaged in a dogfight at the top of the leaderboard until Baddeley uncharacteristically missed a short par putt at the 10th hole for his solitary bogey of the day.

Baddeley (67-65), who started one shot behind Moseley (65-66), hit a fabulous fairway wood into the 507m par 5 fourth hole to momentarily take the outright lead with an eagle.

But Moseley responded immediately, making his birdie at the same hole to remain 14 under with Baddeley.

Moseley reclaimed his outright lead with a birdie at the short par 4 5th hole to go to 15 under and moved to 16 under at the 8th with yet another birdie.

The day though wasn't a two-man war with gritty NSW professional Peter Lonard sitting at 13 under par through 11 holes when play was suspended.

Lonard, who wants to win in the hope of snaring an invite to next year's Augusta Masters, played with the same machine-like consistency which got him into 24 of 25 cuts on the US Tour this year.

He's had just one bogey, at the 14th hole on Thursday, in 47 holes - the same as Moseley, whose new found patience was evident a few times when he scrambled for par saves.

Baddeley has carded seven bogeys in the event, underlining his magnificent putting for his 19 birdies and an eagle.

PGA officials refused to confirm reports they had fined Daly $10,000 for his antics when he engaged in a heated argument with a Tour official, threw his putter in the lake at the 18th hole and refused to sign his scorecard.

A skin diver retrieved Daly's putter but there was no sign of the "Wild Thing".

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