THE temperatures has hit 40.8C in Adelaide today – and it will be even hotter than expected on the weekend with the forecast now for 43C on Sunday and Monday.
The Bureau of Meteorology’s 4pm forecast is for 41C on Saturday and 43C on Sunday and Monday, posing an extremely high risk of bushfires.
The temperature is not expected to drop below the mid 20s at night and there will be no real relief from the heat in Adelaide until Tuesday mid-morning, when a cool change is forecast to bring an expected top of 26C.
More than 1500 elderly and vulnerable people have received daily phone calls today as part of the Red Cross Telecross REDI program to determine how they are coping with the heat.
Red Cross SA executive director Kerry Symons said the system in which people pre-register to be called on hot days, will run until the heatwave is over.
“We saw first-hand how important the service was last November, with almost 300 people needing help during the period and six people hospitalised as a result of the calls,” she said.
“We hope to be able to prevent serious heat-related incidents in the coming days.”
The State Government has also issued a warning to all South Australians to look after themselves and the vulnerable during the current heatwave.
Acting Health Minister Jane Lomax-Smith urged those going to the Schutzenfest to remember that alcohol dehydrates you and said everyone should remember to stay rehydrated.
Families and Communities Minister Jennifer Rankine urged people to check on elderly family members and neighbours.
Fire bans across state
A total fire ban has been declared in eight of the state’s fire districts and the West Coast has been rated as an extreme danger zone.
The Mount Lofty Ranges, the Mid North, the Yorke Peninsula, the Lower South East, the Flinders, the Eastern and Lower Eyre Peninsula have all been rated as severe danger zones.
Read the rest of the story here.
Yeah,
well right now I’m getting shovel snow that I was never supposed to see again, so according to the Met Office.
Let me guess, record cold in the Northern Hemisphere is just weather and natural variation, a hot Australian summer is definite proof of global warming…
Hottest since 1981?
Note that there is no mention of smashing any heat records. This is normal climate conditions for this time of year, isn’t it?
Not sure why this story was selected…
Is the entire Southern Hemisphere suffering from massive heat waves in the way that the entire Northern Hemisphere is suffering from massive cold blasts?
To listen to Joe Romm as interviewed by Neil Cavuto, you’d think that is what is supposed to be going on.
Accoring to Romm, the Earth has only warmed by 1 deg. F in 100 years.
So, what’s the big deal?
1 deg F won’t stop a LIA anymore than making a big difference in the magnitude of a MegaDrought or Dust Bowl Decade. It won’t raise sea levels, but we sure can waste a lot of time & resources trying to alter the Global Climate in a display of astronomical futility.
Now this is Climate. Quite unlike Britain, Europe, Russia, China and the US, where we have only weather.
well, we all know it can’t be record cold everywhere. At least one part of the world should be experiencing hot weather. But it still doesn’t detract from the fact that Global Warming is BS.
Thank you for this article, it shows that your site is fair and committed to reporting the facts, even when it’s not something beneficial for us who do’t believe in the Global Warming debacle.
Strange days indeed! The “weather is not climate argument” is popular these days:
http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?prev=no&hl=en&u=http://www.cicero.uio.no/webnews/index.aspx?id=11295
If you add up the temperature readings from all parts of the globe throughout the year, you get an increasing trend in temperature. It will not stop even if we shivered our way through days here in the north.
Sure this is wishful thinking:
http://climate4you.com/GlobalTemperatures.htm#TrendDiagram%20UAH%20RSS
Honest climate scientists are rare these days…
Why is this on your website? Nothing unusual, no record. It is summer in south east Australia and this is quite normal.
Reply: Normal is the new extreme ~ctm
Fine yacht racing weather offshore. Adelaide is very dry climate. The wet month is June.
So….it’s hot during the summer? ; )
This is not inconsistent with global cooling.
and what is the “normal” temp for this period?
this is for the idiots (ie: the journalists who rarely visit this site),
It is summer in the Southern hemisphere. And 40C is not at all strange for the interior of Australia, neither is 50C.
I noted that neither the AdelaideNow piece or the news video made any mention of this being record breaking. Does anyone know how common or uncommon these kinds of temps are for this area?
If it is this hot on the cold coast of Australia, what are the (unadjusted) temps on the tropical side in Darwin, the East coast in Brisbane, and the West coast in Perth. While this weather just as the cold in the NH is weather, 43C is damn hot!
On Intellicast’s maps for forecast highs Australia is currently the hottest location on the planet right now, there doesn’t seem to be a forecast major heatwave in Africa and South America is seeing what could be expected for their Summer.
“Let me guess, record cold in the Northern Hemisphere is just weather and natural variation, a hot Australian summer is definite proof of global warming…
”
Exactly.
I noted in the other thread that AMSU daily temps are still VERY high, near record level. So while we shiver in the NH, it’s GOT to be hotter then eleventybillion Hells somewhere….
When a bushfire rages through uncleared farm land, will Kevin Rudd have to give carbon credits back to the UN?
It’s called………summer.
The highest January temperature in central Adelaide1890-1980:
http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/ncc/cdio/weatherData/av?p_display_type=dataGraph&p_stn_num=023000&p_nccObsCode=40&p_month=01
And for 1980-2009:
http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/ncc/cdio/weatherData/av?p_display_type=dataGraph&p_stn_num=023090&p_nccObsCode=40&p_month=01
Those are the sorts of temperatures we experienced when we lived in Adelaide. Its climate is of the desert’s edge/Mediterranean variety. The heat is bearable because the summer humidity is typically so low. We didn’t have air-conditioning – as long as you had a ceiling fan, you could sleep easily.
Thanks, Anthony, for including the hot with the cold.
That is a good reminder that all observations must be considered.
With kind regards,
Oliver K. Manuel
sonicfrog (11:28:05) says:
From my memory of Adelaide, temperatures like that normally occur later, like late Feb.
However, last year South Eastern Australia saw similar high temp, I believe, because of blocking highs or something.
Ok. Why is this article here?
It’s to answer the question of how much counter-warming is going on in the S. Hemisphere. Australia is it, with a typical summer heat wave on the South Australian Coast. They didn’t say ‘record breaking’.
From Christopher Hanley (12:06:54) :
Then it looks about par for January highest temps.
I doubt it. Interesting also that although New Zealand have yet to publish their 2009 Summary, if you check their seasonal summaries for the year, I would say that 2009 will not reflect any warming, perhaps even colder than recent years:
http://www.niwa.co.nz/our-science/climate/publications/all/cs
So something different went on in Australia in 2009. There were definitely more heatwaves than normal even during last winter. But in the words on the famous poem written by Dorothea Mackellar in 1904:
I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of drought and flooding rains.
We are used to it and as most Australians live on the coastal plain there is always a cool change a few days away. Unless some nutter arsonists (or maybe something else) starts some fires, it should pass without too much ado.
As expected, out come the nutters:
”
Labor seizes on temperature figures as evidence of global warming
Environment Minister Peter Garrett said today the finding that Australia’s annual mean temperature for 2009 was 0.9C above the 1961-90 average exposed Tony Abbott’s false climate change claim that global warming has stopped.
“This false and misleading claim is today shown to be completely at odds with the rigorous scientific findings of the independent experts at the Bureau of Meteorology,” Mr Garrett said.
”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/labor-seizes-on-temperature-figures-as-evidence-of-global-warming/story-e6frg6xf-1225816209762
Some of that million-degree heat from the Earth’s interior must be leaking out through Australia…
I’ve been hearing met-office officials stating that southern Europe is experiencing unprecedented hot December/January temperatures this winter.
Extreme heat in central Adelaide has not become more frequent since mid-twentieth century:
http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/ncc/cdio/weatherData/av?p_display_type=dataGraph&p_stn_num=023000&p_nccObsCode=36&p_month=01
http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/ncc/cdio/weatherData/av?p_display_type=dataGraph&p_stn_num=023090&p_nccObsCode=36&p_month=01
Born and bred Adelaidian here. Yes, it gets hot and dry in summer. That is normal. The temperatures get to 40 for quite a few days during most summers. 43 is unusual though. I haven’t looked it up, though I expect pretty easy to find, but I think hitting 43 would be very rare.
Australia at 45C, when was that? Well I know this song that mentions it, came out in 1987.
Beds Are Burning – Midnight Oil
OK, I couldn’t help myself. All right then.
Men at work: Land down under!!!! (One of their best songs!!)
Interesting. El Nino conditions are still in place as well – although their map shows December as cold in most of US. So, I guess things like this is why we were still a little above on overall global temps in December.
Christopher Hanley
Thanks for the links. Record appears to be 46C (115F) or 3C (5.4F) hotter than forecast on Sunday/Monday.
There will likely be far fewer dying from higher temperatures in Australia than from colder temperatures in Europe/US. see NIPCC’s Human health effects
rbateman- Exactly right…
Looking at the forecast highs for the region…the rest of Australia is about normal…only South Australia (the bush) is getting warmer weather…
Current conditions as of 6:00AM (local time)in Port Adelaide (Current time 7:02AM) Temp is 68F – High for today 99F (Low 69F) – Tomorrow High 96F (Low 76F) – Sun High 98F (low 72F) gets cooler after that…
So somewhat above the Average High for Jan of 82F but nothing unheard of by US standards…Just ask Arizona!
Bottomline: The rest of the world is either normal or well BELOW Average!!! Europe/Asia/NA/SA/Africa…etc
Globally speaking…this is a cooling trend.
G
Hot in the summer? Who ever could have imagined.
I think the AGW crowd will change it’s tune somewhere around June, July, and August this year. That’s when they will notice food shortage in the US. The Department of Agriculture says we have enough supply to last us till August this year. That’s two months short. And you know what the kicker is? We have no supplies in reserve. But that’s not the best part. The best part is, food prices will probably double and triple by then. That’s when you will see the AGW crowd change it’s tune. Don’t ask me where I got this.
Aha! I’ve got it! It’s that pipeline of heating we’re supposed to have waiting and means we need to spend gazillions now to combat. Only the pesky Australians have gone and diverted it from the northern hemisphere.
Australia is hot, needs water.
The Northern Hemisphere is cold, snowy, needs road salt.
Why aren’t they building desalinization plants in Australia? There are markets for both of the main products. There are profits to be had, get capitalism moving on it!
And if the greenies complain, explain how you are making sea salt for their healthy-living lower-sodium veggie cooking. Surely you can sell them on that, after all they are still buying global warming.
AdderW, DonK31….
Here’s a link to Adelaide Climatology graph
http://www.weatherzone.com.au/images/climate/wz_clim_annual_site_23090.png
I can tell you that it is one one of the hottest cities in Aus in the summer, 43C is hot but not unheard of by any stretch.
Tim, Scarsdale, Vic, Aust.
Wonder what the conditions were in Adelaide during the Dalton Minimum.
Specifically the year without a summer.
Ho hum….Typical Adelaide summer heat-wave here High thirties to low forties as normal…Nothing unusual about that…Occurs every Summer a 3 or 4 or 5 or or 7 or 8 times at least!
I must have read wrong… nowhere in the article are the words “climate change” or “climate warming”… surely something is wrong.
If the northern hemisphere is so cold, the heat must get out somewhere. It seems it wans to get out through the ozone hole at the south pole… if you add that heat to that of the southern summer… yeah, it must be hot there.
Michael (12:42:21) :
I think the AGW crowd will change it’s tune somewhere around June, July, and August this year. That’s when they will notice food shortage in the US. […] Don’t ask me where I got this.
Okay then, I won’t ask. I will post this link to a long informative article that, while alarmist in tone and predicting The Even Greater World Depression, looks well researched with a well laid-out case for concern. It comes from an investment site BTW.
Nothing new! We can look at history and see that this has all happened before. Once again, I refer to the NY Times. This time it was 1896; the headlines read: “HOTTEST OF HOT WAVES ON RECORD. ….Adelaide, Australia, marked 127 (degrees F) in the shade.” That’s 52.8 C!
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9C07E1DA1539E632A2575BC1A96E9C94679ED7CF
Another article in 1898 leads off with “AUSTRALIA BURNS IN THE SUN,” where average daytime temperatures were 124F (51C). If we had CNN back then, Anderson Cooper would have started his “Planet In Peril” show and all the greenies would have predicted that the world would be at war by 1914 because of Global Warming.
Here in the U.S. we’re about to go through a nationwide phenomenon known as the January thaw, milder air throughout the whole country pretty much. What’s interesting is this.
http://www.farmersalmanac.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=1121
This guy (dunno if he works for the almanac), says the thaw should last 2 weeks before the Eastern 2/3rds of the U.S. sees a return to harsh Winter weather and cold. He also says he has wild forecasts as we go into Summer too.
why can’t they just prop up some of their fancy ass bird beaters (windmills) and point them this direction to warm things up in the NH?
Another Adelaidean here. Good to see a few others here on WUWT. Heat waves like this are normal in our summer Dec- Feb, and occasionally we get a heat wave in March too. Last year was unusual in that we had a heat wave in November, but then December was very unremarkable and seemed coolish. If you live here then a few days of 41C is not unusual. Its when it gets up to 46 that it gets hard to deal with. Personally I like it cool to sleep well and an AC in the bedroom is needed for me, unlike others like Dearieme who think its cool enough to sleep with just a ceiling fan. Been there and done that and it isn’t!
Check the record, the highest mean temps for Adelaide in Jan and Feb are all in the earlier records.
They are higher by about 2C for both months.
These temps are normal for Adelaide, it’s like saying gee we had 2 inches of rain overnight in Tully in Queensland, it just doesn’t make sense.
It’s the millions of degrees Earth’s core seeping through Australia’s crust…
“Acting Health Minister Jane Lomax-Smith urged those going to the Schutzenfest to remember that alcohol dehydrates you and said everyone should remember to stay rehydrated.”
By having another beer.
I know, I know, I get it, I get it !!!!
You see, the NH is cold and the SH is warm and those are the facts see, and that is how physics work see, but we have it all wrong when we imagine that North is UP, see?
The entire universe has flipped “upside” down, heat moves up and cold sinks, easy, we just got the fundamentals wrong. Turn the whole universe the right way up and the physics fall into place ! And in 6 months time, the universe will flip again making the NH warm and the SH cold, easy.
Pingo (11:51:41) :
“This is not inconsistent with global cooling.”
Very, very funny!
I lived in Adelaide for 15 years from 1978 to 1993 before moving to south east Queensland. Adelaide’s climate is very harsh and over 40 deg C is not unusual in summer. I remember going soaring on one 44deg day. Sailplane pilots wait for those days in summer as the convection gets very deep and even though the air is dry the convection is deep enough to get cumulus at up to 16000 feet. Sailplane pilots love cumulus clouds as they mark the thermals.
Those days are also marked by quite strong and gusty northerly winds so any bushfires travel at great speed aided by the properties of eucalyptus trees aka natural napalm or fuel air explosives.
High temperatures caused by a High in the Tasman sea between Aust and NZ which then causes the air flow to come down onto Adelaide after crossing about 2000kms of hot dry desert to the north of Adelaide. A desert which has been further denuded by feral camels, in plague proportions
It happens every year to greater or lesser extents, and those of us who have lived here for awhile, see nothing unusual.
Is Co2 making it hotter? …dont know… and they dont either.
Temperature records are only marginally better than those in the USA and elsewhere. Normal standard applies.
It’s about the bushfires.
It’s about folk naturally worried by extreme events.
Our side-of-the-road bushfire signs used to show “Extreme” as the top setting, now we have “Catastrophic”.
It’s government by fear.
So at a time when we should be promoting Australia as a warm, sunny, safe place to visit for all you frozen ones we have these types of messages.
So, “Don’t mention the sharks. Come on in the water’s great”.
Cheers Jack
(and my ceiling fan works a treat – quiet, little energy usage, fresh air)
Deaths from cold weather:
This is just a random google sample:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/8425805.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3342939.stm
http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=574
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/dec/30/severe-weather-road-deaths
http://www.lgcplus.com/news/more-cold-weather-deaths-warning/1984218.article
….and so it goes, but you get the picture.
Yes, my brother who lives in Melbourne area tells me it’s done nothing but rain until recently when he was on holiday in Noosa, Queensland. (Whereas Melbourne specialised in going through all four seasons in one day).
Michael (12:42:21) :
“…. But that’s not the best part. The best part is, food prices will probably double and triple by then. That’s when you will see the AGW crowd change it’s tune. Don’t ask me where I got this.
I am assuming this is some “insider” info but I am not surprised to see it since I have been expecting something like this to happen soon. If one of the food safety bills makes it through Congress it will definitely happen. The average age of the US farm is in their fifties and they are not about to put up with lots of government regulations and the risk of high fines (up to $1,000,000/day/incident) No one is going to bother to buy the land to farm it either.
I strongly suggest planting a garden this coming spring!”
No Chance of US Bumper Harvest: This lists all the crop failures this fall http://www.marketskeptics.com/2009/09/no-chance-of-bumper-us-harvest.html
2010 Food Crisis for Dummies: “If you read any economic, financial, or political analysis for 2010 that doesn’t mention the food shortage looming next year, throw it in the trash, as it is worthless. There is overwhelming, undeniable evidence that the world will run out of food next year….” http://www.marketskeptics.com/2009/12/2010-food-crisis-for-dummies.html
May 2008 “While the previous surpluses were costly and sharply criticized, much of the food found its way to the poor, here and abroad. Today, says USDA Undersecretary Mark Keenum, “Our cupboard is bare.” U.S. government food surpluses have evaporated..” http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2008-05-01-usda-food-supply_N.htm
From January 2008 year (I do not have access to look at this year) ‘Panic Buying’ in the Grain Markets: “Officials last month forecast U.S. wheat stocks will shrink to their lowest level in 60 years. The U.S. is the world’s largest exporter of wheat, and importing countries are bidding heavily for its crops as other exporters cut supplies. The USDA has cautioned in six months wheat exporters in the US have already sold more than 90 percent of what the agency expected to be exported for the entire year.” http://www.financialsense.com/fsu/editorials/dancy/2008/0104.html
A PEW report and my own experience (loss of over two foot of topsoil on my farm) back up this report:
“The world’s soils continue to be degraded at an unprecedented rate that will only exacerbate the current food crisis, scientists are warning.
The current surge in food prices has been blamed on factors such as the diversion of food crops into biofuels production, coupled with poor harvests caused by droughts, floods and pests. But the situation was a long time in coming, experts say, with unexpectedly poor harvests stressing an already weakened food production system.
According to a report by the World Resources Institute, world agricultural production has fallen by one-sixth, and one-fifth of the world’s cropland is now considered degraded….” http://www.naturalnews.com/024280.html
April 2008: “This global mobilisation [of farmers organisations] is taking place as hunger is back on the public agenda. Food prices have been rising dramatically over the past year and hunger riots are happening in various parts of the world. For La Via Campesina, the current food crisis is largely due to speculation and trade liberalisation in the agriculture sector. Large food traders are now speculating on expected future shortages and rising prices artificially, creating hunger and increasing poverty. On the other hand, the steady dismantling of state mechanisms (such as buffer stocks and import controls) over the past decades has left countries extremely vulnerable to food price volatility.” http://corporatewatch.wordpress.com/category/food-agriculture/
Manufacturing Food Crisis: http://agrariancrisis.wordpress.com/2008/09/12/manufacturing-food-crisis/
The suicide economy of corporate globalisation: http://agrariancrisis.wordpress.com/2007/03/22/the-suicide-economy-of-corporate-globalisation-2/
Food Security, Farming, CAFTA and the WTO http://www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/cafta/Agriculture.html
Gail Combs (14:18:06) :
Thanks for posting that.
Market skeptics has many realistic articles on the agriculture subject.
Do you remember Storm X-change? Anybody know what happened to them? They used to provide real agriculture news/weather, its been hard to find detailed agri-news.
Ahhh….looks nice. I love heatwaves.
Totally missing from this (boring) story is the massive amount of rain and floods in that region just before Christmas. Now that was newsworthy!
Tropical cyclone Laurence crossed the Coast of North West Australia and traveled all the way to the South East of the country dumping huge amounts of water on the way.
Many places got more than their annual rainfall in a couple of days.
Cyclones do this all the time and are an important source of water to the interior. If we can get some healthy global warming going it will happen more often and Central Australia will become quite a lot wetter
Gail Combs (14:18:06) : Wrote
“Michael (12:42:21) :
“…. But that’s not the best part. The best part is, food prices will probably double and triple by then. That’s when you will see the AGW crowd change it’s tune. Don’t ask me where I got this.
I am assuming this is some “insider” info but I am not surprised to see it since I have been expecting something like this to happen soon.”
Thank you Gail for your excellent analysis of the situation. You have really done your homework.
Inside information? Not really, It’ just something I’ve been keeping my eye on. I don’t always give a complete analysis of the many subjects I know and post about, because I just don’t have the time with everything on my plate. I count on people like you who already have this kind of information at hand. And besides, when someone else confirms something I have to say, some things that may sound a bit nutty, others are more inclined to sit up and take notice because of good people like you who step up and add validity to my simple statement.
Deepest Thanks Gail and Others.
Hmm…. It’s January, It’s Australia, and it’s … hot?? Who would have thought? I just hope nobody tells Peter Garrett. Poor bloke’s got enough on his plate.
BTW, it’s quite warm here in Victoria as well.
OK, who stole our summer ??
I’m on the Great Barrier Reef and temps should be between 30 / 35 deg C. so far this summer we have a couple of days over 30. At the moment, 9:30 AM, it is only 24.7C, rain, and windy !
I’ll have to take the boat for a run, warm the planet, 16 cylinders at a time.
For what it’s worth, in contrast to Adelaide’s heatwave there were unseasonal falls of snow in the mountains in the South Island of NZ overnight at the height of our summer. Just weather. What would we talk about without it?
Meanwhile back at the ranch … the politics of water still goes on re this article in The Australian by Matthew Franklin, chief political correspondent From: The Australian January 09, 2010 12:00AM
“Wong slaps down critics of $23bn Darling River water purchase
FEDERAL Water Minister Penny Wong has deflected opposition criticism of the government’s $23 billion purchase of Toorale Station in NSW, revealing the move has returned 11 gigalitres of water to the Darling River.
…
The row follows calls in yesterday’s The Australian for a review of water-sharing arrangements between states after a call by South Australian for NSW to release water from the Menindee Lakes storage to flow downstream.
Current arrangements mean NSW does not have to release water until the storage exceeds 640GL, far more than is expected to accumulate from recent rains.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/wong-slaps-down-critics-of-23bn-water-purchase/story-e6frg6nf-1225817491470
Not sure about the $23bn figure, whilst Toorale Station is big (we’re talking the size of small – now frozen – European countries) I don’t recall that much money being spent, maybe $23 Mil. Mind you the Rudd government did give away $42 Bil for our economic stimulus … which we didn’t need because they then put up interest rates, 3 times.
Jack
Wow, the WUWT effect is still very strong and can revive old sunspots… you put up a picture of the sun and voila… the old decaying 1035 comes back to life. IT’S ALIVE, ALIVE! And of course, NOAA gives it a new number to forge the statistics.
Sounds like summer in the interior of the US West Coast….
Christopher Hanley 12:06:54
As I suspect you infer from the BOM graphs, there is nothing unusual about current maximum temps in Adelaide. In my infancy in 1939, four of five days between January 9 and 13 had maxima equalling or exceeding 46 degrees C, a record that stands unbroken. I have lived in Adelaide most of my life. Very warm this morning (10:29 CSST), comfortable with an electric fan circulating air in the room. Unlike many today, my wife and do not fret. Nor will we in June-July when maximum temps may fall to 10 degrees C (mild compared with current NH conditions). We have lived long enough to be highly sceptical about AGW.
I found this article amusing. The irony of weather was most obvious this morning as I sat here in Adelaide and called my Mother back in Colorado to visit. The temperature had gotten to minus 25F back home. Water pipes were frozen and the garage door was stuck by ice to the floor. At the same time I’m sitting here in Adelaide figuring how not to get sun stroke. But as I sit here balancing both extremes, I know I’m luckier to be in Adelaide.
I could go to the beach today. But the waters here off Adelaide are too cold to make it really enjoyable. You find your testicles somewhere near your jaw line when you finally decide to make the plunge.
So, North Dakota’s 38 deg C summers are climate, but thier -38 deg C winters are weather. Austrailian summers can be brutal, and from what I know about Aussies 40 deg summers are normal to them. I suppose the media must balance things out.
I was in Barbados one Sept right after a hurricane. It was dead calm, not a breeze. It was in the 40’s in the day. I was staying in my parents house with a ceiling fan in each room, no air. It got down to 33 around 3 am. Then I could sleep until the sun rose at 7 am and it got hot again. Nobody checked on anybody. It was just normal weather in the tropics. At the moment, in Canada, it is minus 17 outside and the furnace is going on every 2 to 3 minutes. That weather sounds pretty good.
Is this consistent with El Nino? From what I had heard it was a huge South American phenomenon but should have lesser effects other places? Any good docs to recommend on what happens during El Nino?
If it were not for the inaction of Australian Government to ALLOW for the clearing of the Bush of old timber and the introduction of controlled burn off’s Then the whole fire situation would not be an issue!. Just look at he Meaningfully STUPID policy of confiscation of private farms AS Carbon sinks, an not allowing farmers to clear brush from their land for Agriculture shows how far the Eugenics professor RUDD will go to!
I have friends who just spent their yearly month of vacation in Sydney. They said that the weather was unseasonably rainy. He’s a sailor who grew up there and moved to the US about fifteen years ago in his forties, so he’s pretty aware of the history of the weather in Sydney.
Time and time again tyrants have used climate to enslave the populous with need for sacrifice always given from the workers to the POWER ELITE for the sake favorable climate!.
When one understands that the ACTIVE policies of the Government of Australia are to encourage the worse affects of climate by NOT planning for acts of nature, then you reading this will truly understand how wide spread this tyranny is!.
No one lives in Adelaide anyway.
Sydney has been unusually cold and rainy this year.
Michael (12:25:48) :
And where is their lead singer, Peter Garrett now? Telling us we are all going to die from Climate Change, being the current “Minister for Environment” (& Climate Change, of course).
The highest temperature I could find (/www.wunderground.com) in all of Australia was 44.5C in Whyalla, South Australia at 1:18 PM local time. This is within the past hour of this post. The weather forecast for Whyalla is 20.5C max next Wednesday. Isn’t that sweater weather most places, especially in the summer? Shouldn’t the headline rather be “Unusual Summer Cold Snap Coming”?
Just wait for a deluge….but don´t complain:-)
Michael (12:42:21) :
“…. But that’s not the best part. The best part is, food prices will probably double and triple by then. That’s when you will see the AGW crowd change it’s tune. Don’t ask me where I got this.
Between the recent late springs and early winters, and the incredibly misguided conversion of productive farmland to growing stock for ethanol, Michael is probably right.
TanGeng (17:26:42) : El Nino it is almost a trade mark of north peruvian fishermen who named as such a warm north-south current that sometimes runs opposing the cold Humboldt´s current that runs from south to north. Now the Humboldt´s current is running as usual driven by the counter clock wise pacific anticyclone winds which run from south-north-east and there are no hot El Nino waters along the norther peruvian coasts, so there is no El Nino, though the difference between pressures in Tahiti and Darwing are negative, indicating that this differential pressure would drive an El Nino current from El Nino 3+4 area to 1+2 area (along the northern peruvian coasts) but, again, this is not happening.
However there is a hot spot around Easter Island surrounded by cold waters.
This phenomenon is singular and it is not of the “SETTLED” kind, so it deserves special attention from non-settled experts.
http://weather.unisys.com/surface/sst_anom.html
Jack M. (18:15:24) :
Couldn’t help but laugh!
here is a map of the distribution of maxima in Australia on the 8th of January.
Plenty of 40C plus near the mining towns in the Kimberley in WA but Adelaide as the Capitol city of the state of South Australia gets all the media attention.
There is seasonal monsoonal activity in the Northern Territory and it looks like jet stream movement is involved in the cloud/rain/cooler temps in North Eastern Australia.
Where I live at (1964ft ,35E 149W) is on the fringe of a NW to SE movement of dry hot air below the monsoonal stream and today at 34degC is fairly typical for January.
Our heat is like Adelaide and is inland heat, full of extremes, untempered by the ocean.
So did it hit 40C today? It’s only 31C right now.
I was in Adelaide in the mid 90s – it got up to 45 in the city and 48 in Mildura. I remember it clearly because when you breathed the dry air burnt your throat. Also there were reports of birds dropping dead out of the sky. Now I wonder if those temps are still in the BOM record – or have they been adjusted out as well!
JonesII (19:07:26) :
It is the enormous hot spot centred at 45S/130W that concerns me, I may be the only one as nobody lives there 🙂
I have noticed that “normal” heat waves in Southern Australia, typically occur roughly 40 days apart, suggesting that they may be driven by Madden-Julian (M-J) waves in the tropics. The arrival of a M-J wave in Northern Australia, roughly every 40 days, sets off a surge in monsoonal rainfall which pumps vast amounts of air into the upper troposphere. The Earth’s Hadley Cell circualation pattern moves this air towards the Southern parts of Australia where it descends, compresses, drys and warms, creating a belt of high pressure systems.
This hot dry descending air tends to build up strong (stationary) high pressure systems off the SE coast of Australia which redirect hot dry surface air back over the central Australian deserts, leading to a build up the thermal heat that is stored in the air over the southern parts of Australia (especially over South Australia and Victoria). Voila! You have the conditions for a heat wave.
One double heat wave in SA and Victoria, lasting from Jan 01st – 07th and then returning on Jan 13th – 19th in 1908 killed 246 people. During the second of these heat waves, Adelaide, experienced 44-45 C temperatures for four days straight (Jan 15th through to 19th).
Of course, it must have been CAGW back then!
it’s weather
So what? It can get over 50 Celsius in the Sahara desert when it’s summer there.
To put things in perspective Adelaide had record winters rains, October was coldest month for 56 years, December temps were lower than average, the current expected four days of high temperatures is not unusual.
Yep, I’m in Murray Bridge at the moment….. I was here about a year ago at the same place doing the same thing in about the same heat….. with about the same amount of flies…..and the punters at the show tonight will drink about the same amount of beer…..
Interesting to here that it snowed at home (NZ) last night?
It snowed just before New Years Eve as well….
None of this has anything to do with global warming 🙂
I have never denied the holocaust and I’m in no way an extremist for saying that am I? (note to self read 11:32 book of Gore, New testament to find out)
Thanks to the group for letting me share this…..soon I will have finished my rehabilitation by getting baptized in a spa pool filled with green cool aid……until then, I’ll keep trying to believe in the global warming bible, readings of which can be found everyday in news papers and TV news programs.
It’s getting warmer, it’s getting warmer, shame on me for being born a scum of the earth human!
JonesII: Thanks for that info. So basically what is being said is that the El Nino is not happening – so the predictions of El Nino was a dud??? Wasn’t it half a year ago that there were stories of the 2009-2010 El Nino popping about suggesting that 2010 might be one of the hottest years on record? If the El Nino didn’t happen then it would suggest that there isn’t much chance of that then.
What would be interesting to know is what was the basis for those predictions that were made. Especially interesting to know which hypothesis were falsified and which climate models were shown to be unreliable. Of course there is potential for El Nino to still manifest. We’ll have to see what the truth actually turns out to be.
Again, thanks for the enlightenment.
Hi All,
I happen to live in Adelaide and the temp is currently 40.9 (C) There is nothing particularly special about this and neither will a couple of days at 43. The last “heat wave” we had in Nov was linked to GW by the ABC. Our less than average temps in Dec were of course ignored and I note that the BBC reminded everyone that the cold in the UK was just weather. So as one wrote of the alarmists and MSM “Hot weather is climate and cold weather is weather.” (sic)
Not too far north from here in 1980 I experienced a week where the temp did not drop below 38 (night or day) and we hit 52 in the shade. So for all that warming since 1980 a peak of 43 or even 45 is hardly worth commenting on.
Welcome to Australia. This is what we expect in summer, no big deal. On the one hand you have South Australia having normal high summer temps. On the other you have Queensland under flood waters from a normal monsoon trough.
All in all quite a comfey place to live.
Move along please, nothing to see here.
Ian
Canberra
The most continuous hot weather is when there is an upper trough from the Gulf of Carpentaria down to say Sydney. The pattern stays for a week or so, and inland NSW towns under the trough cop 47 degrees centigrade every day for a week, which is hell if you are attempting to launch foot-launched hang gliders and continually failing to get away in a thermal.
According to the UK met office this is the most prolonged cold spell since the winter of 81/82. In December 81 my flight to Adelaide took 5 days because of the snow in the UK – we left 3 days late from Manchester in a blizzard.
In January 82 Adelaide had the hottest temperatures for 40 years reaching a maximum of 44C – seems quite a similar situation to now, not sure what the fuss is about other than the local councils here believed the met office forecast of a mild wet winter and didn’t prepare properly.
No one thought it was unusual back then – we’d ony just got over the impending ice age from a few years earlier!
The BOM historical record shows these maximum temperatures for 10th Jan in these years
1939 45.9
1999 41.9
1905 41.3
1927 41
2009 40.8
2007 40.5
1889 40.2
1991
These are for the old site at West Terrace years 1839-1980 #23000, or later from Adelaide airport 1955-2007 #23034.
1991 40.2
Being an Ex South Aussie, now living in Vic, I remember hot summers in Adelaide, this is nothing new, and will always stay the same. the thing with South Australia is it’s location, surrounded by hardly any vegetation, you get the hot winds blowing in from the outback (inland Australia for the uninitiated) and it’s bloody hot! I like to watch the weather a lot, and when a High Pressure system gets to south east Australia, it tends to hang over there for a few days, which provides the winds that heats up South Australia, by the time the high pressure system starts to move eastwards, it moves a lot quicker and then Vic only gets one or two warm days then the winds will swing around and bring in the cooler air from down south. Last year in Victoria, we had severe bushfires after a few days in a row over 45C which killed 178 people. And this was all blamed on climate change, when in fact, no one was allowed to clear up any dead or dying vegeation around their properties because green folk took hold in political areas and deemed it wrong to do so. It was even said that last year was one of our worst summers, and quite frankly that is wrong, I remember last summer very well, and bar those few severe days that lead to the bushfires it was a pretty average summer for Vic. Before this summer came around, we were being warned that this was going to be one hell of an extreme summer in Vic, but so far its been average again, a couple of hot days here and there, but not a great deal over 30C, although they are saying we are going to get to 41 or 42 here on Monday, the next few days will again be 30, 20, 22. But just watch for our (somewhat of a hermit lately after being ignored at Copenhagen) Prime Minister come out of hiding to say this is proof of climate change/global warming, which ever sounds the most extreme at the time! He announced proudly in Parliament just a couple of months ago when there was some unseasonably warm weather, saying there is your proof. I think I’ve rambled on too long now that I may not have made sense lol 🙂
SMS (16:45:23) :
I could go to the beach today. But the waters here off Adelaide are too cold to make it really enjoyable. You find your testicles somewhere near your jaw line when you finally decide to make the plunge.”
SMA, I’m just back from the beach and the water off West Beach was quite mild, certainly not cold. Testicles fortunately did not head too far north!
by the way, the max here in Adelaide was 41.3C, hot but certainly not unusual.
The BOM historical record shows these maximum temperatures above 40 deg C for 10th Jan in these years
1939 45.9
1999 41.9
1905 41.3
1927 41
2008 40.8
2007 40.5
1889 40.2
1991 40.2
These are for the old site at West Terrace years 1839-1980 #23000, or later from Adelaide airport 1955-2007 #23034.
If 10th January 2010 proves to be above 40 deg C, yes, it will be hot. As for breaking records, time will tell.
The following day, Jan 11th, has these historical maximums
1898 43.1
1982 42.9
1905 42.2
1951 40.5
2005 40.3
Temperatures can change rapidly. The day after the 10th January 2008 hot day of 40.8, the maximum temperature was 25.1. The next year, 2009, the maximums for 10th and 11th January were 25.8 and 26.1 deg C.
Over the historic record, there are about 300 days when Adelaide’s maximum daily temperature exceeded or equalled 40 deg C.
All of these figures are subject to such UHI and adjustments as might have been applied.
As I recall, the UK had a scorching hot summer in 1976 – right at the peak of the global cooling scare!
“rbateman (11:38:44) :
Is the entire Southern Hemisphere suffering from massive heat waves in the way that the entire Northern Hemisphere is suffering from massive cold blasts?”
If you believe MSM then yes, the SH is in heatwave conditions. We, finally, got some summer here in the inner west of Sydney. It got to 40c, it was hot but dry with it, ~40% humidity, which makes it bearable. Still, we’ll soon be back to fall temperatures, sub 30c by Tuesday and I’ll bet that’ll be our summer done and dusted this year.
I have good memories of being in places where the temperature nudged 40 deg C, I have no terms of reference for what I’ve been seeing on the IntelliWeather widget for North America and weather underground temps for Europe.
Surely you’re better off in budgie smugglers than trying to get about wearing a whole wardrobe.
This warmist story helps Anthony against accusations by warmisters that he only posts stories beneficial to his sceptical views. However, I think you should add “another just weather not climate story” as you do with many of your cold weather stories.
Since the Northern Hemisphere is experiencing record cold whilst the Southern Hemisphere is experience record heat, does this not indicate that the extremes may have something to do with a change in the tilt of the earth’s axis?
Bryan Hughes
2010/01/09 at 4:03am
“Since the Northern Hemisphere is experiencing record cold whilst the Southern Hemisphere is experience record heat, does this not indicate that the extremes may have something to do with a change in the tilt of the earth’s axis?”
Except the SH is not experiencing record heat, as Pielke’s plots demonstrate. The only significant warm anomaly atm is the arctic, where its putting a lot of moisture in the air, which is being dumped to the south as snow, increasing planetary albedo.
Another Adelaidian here. I concur with the others. This is quite normal. We’ve got a high pressure cell over southern Oz with light northerly winds bringing in hot air from across land.
Forecast for Sunday
Dry, very hot and sunny. Light to moderate southeast to northeast winds with a
light afternoon sea breeze. As the winds move to southerly the weather cools.
Of interest and it would be great to see a breakdown, is this report from our BOM. South Australia in 2009 Warmest year on record for South Australia I found this quite disturbing after reading recent articles on WUWT re Darwin temp records and an article by WM Briggs on Homogenization of temperature series. I’ve begun to wonder what is the value of some supposed mean temp for a region.
cheers
Michael
I thought you might be a grain trader. I have been keeping an eye on farming ever since I realized what the WTO Agreement on Agriculture was designed to do. And that is to move world food production into the hands of the international food cartel and create famines to increase prices. Waxman is sponsoring not only the Cap and Trade bill but the Food Safety bill too. The words traitor and murderer come to mind.
Even the Wall Street Journal has noticed the food problem Slow Harvest Prompts USDA to Raise Crop-Price Outlook http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125789919795042543.html
The USDA has college kids operating computers linked to satellites. A friend’s kid has done this. http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/agoutlook/apr1998/ao250f.pdf
The USDA does provide a harvest forecast service. http://www.ers.usda.gov/Publications/OCE081/ Since the USDA is run by the same international food cartel that gave the world the WTO AoA, I imagine the information is as reliable as that coming out of the MET and CRU…. Unless you are a grain trader. As usual our taxes at work for the benefit of the few and the demise of many. It allows the USDA to hide a comming famine so people can not prepare. (Food hoarding is illegal in the USA anyway)
The move towards famine is accelerating. In 2009 a new entity called the Global Food Initiative was formed by the four leaders of the world food cartel, Monsanto, ADM, DuPont aka Pioneer Seed, and John Deere. It was announced by the G-8 nations, lead by Barack Obama. “The Global Food Initiative calls for fewer, stricter standards, a “farm to fork” approach , the elimination of trade barriers…” This is just a regurgitation of the WTO AoA and HACCP that has served us e-coli with our dinner.
Just like with CAGW where the solution of the “global warming” crisis is in reality a transfer of wealth from the poor and middle class to the financiers and corporate head honchos, regulations and famine will be used to transfer land, seed, livestock and a guaranteed cash flow to the Ag Cartels. http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=2202
The globalists are pushing for the “harmonization” of national laws to the dictates of the WTO (HACCP) “The use of a HACCP approach by food businesses should be recognized by governments as a fundamental tool for improving the safety of foodstuffs.” http://www.ourfood.com/foodsafety/FoodSafetyAndControlSystem14.pdf
HACCP is why the USA now has food poisoning issues. Instead of inspectors inspecting food they inspect paperwork. Under HACCP the plant writes its own food safety plan. “The new role of the [government] inspector was to make sure that plant personnel were carrying out their duties in a manner consistent with the HACCP plan. In many cases this amounted to making sure that all of the paper work was in the proper order.” http://www.mfu.org/node/276
The Global Food Initiative, is all about paperwork and fines for farmers. I get a chill when I see the words “Food Safety Leadership Council On-Farm Standards” and “The Food Safety Leadership Council is an industry group…” and find the “Guidelines established by the Food Business Forum” include:
“Standards applied to farm level activities are built around the establishment risk assessments and foundation programs such as standard operating procedures (SOPs), good management practices (GMPs), sanitation operation procedures (SSOPs), etc… These programs and procedures are required to be documented to allow for an accounting (audit) of how well the firm is performing relative to its established protocols. For example, the Global Food Initiative Guidelines established by the Food Business forum provide detail information on what should be included in a firm’s food safety management system.” http://naamic.tamu.edu/austin/paggi.pdf
This paperwork nightmare is to be applied to farmers across the world. A dairy farmer in the UK said it takes up 60% of his time. As you look at these numbers think of third world farmers.
There are 2,128,982 farms In the USA.
1,519,209 GROSS less than $25,000 a year
298,385 GROSS between $25,000 and $100,000
240,746 farms GROSS between $100,000 and $500,000
Only 70,642 farms GROSS over $500,00, these are the corporate farms
There is little or no money for farmers in the USA to deal with the burden of this paperwork, third world farmers don’t have a snowballs change in hades. Once our independent farmers are gone there is no way to easily undo the mess and we will be looking at reduced food output at higher cost in the face of a possible little Ice Age.
Happy Nightmares everyone.
ex rural sth aussie now in Vic, I remember in 200??( pick any summer really) putting my digital thermo outside under the grapevine in coolest area of my yard on a hot day, it went to 50C and zeroed out, and there were many such summer days.
hot in vic today, but cooler breezes in the arvo which adelaide etc doesnt seem to get that often.
Its been a cool summer, I cannot get any vines to grow, ie pumpkin watermelon etc all took weeks to even sprout and will not produce fruit by the time it cools down.
friend in NT just got 140mm rain and the Ghan train had to go back due to track out.
NSW had floods last week, and WA had fires.
its australia and we love it:-)
support Peter Spencers hunger strike about unpaid repossession of private land for Kyoto Fraud.
http://www.agmates.ning.com
hassle KRUDD he deserves it.
amicus curiae (05:37:32) :
support Peter Spencers hunger strike about unpaid repossession of private land for Kyoto Fraud.
http://www.agmates.ning.com
hassle KRUDD he deserves it.
Reply:
Yes and I love to read ag mates too even though I am in North Carolina USA.
It’s now 14 F (high temp today was 19 F) where I am with a foot of snow on the ground. To keep the house livable I have two wood stoves running and just reading about these temperatures makes me feel warmer.
Thanks, Anthony, for including the hot with the cold.
“Thanks, Anthony, for including the hot with the cold.”
How about the “wet with the dry”?
There is a 110 year record of Australian rainfall produced by the BOM 9 January 2010 in the document from which I take highlights below:
http://www.bom.gov.au/announcements/media_releases/climate/change/20100105.shtml
Rainfall. The last decade shows as the second wettest.
http://i260.photobucket.com/albums/ii14/sherro_2008/Rainfallto2010.jpg?t=1263080553
Here is the start of the BOM commentary on the observations, again with that seemingly omnipresent emphasis on tragedy and catastrophe:
“Based on preliminary data, the overall Australian mean rainfall total for 2009 was 453 mm, slightly less than the long-term average (1961-90) of 464 mm. Above-average rainfall in January and February, especially in the northern tropics, was followed by dry conditions from March onwards, with the March-November total being the 10th lowest on record for Australia. A dry year in the southeast and southwest of mainland Australia has prolonged the multi-year meteorological drought in those regions.
During July to October 2009, serious rainfall deficiencies were experienced over large areas of Queensland and isolated parts of NSW, consistent with the development of an El Niño event during this time. The unusually dry and warm winter was associated with a series of dust-storms across eastern New South Wales and southeast Queensland in September and early October.”
But it’s just weather.
Here in Melbourne it is also hot, BUT it is expected as others have said it is our SUMMER. Here is what really gets me…why is it that we had the fireplace going only a few days ago AND we were wearing jumpers etc when we should be wearing shorts and sunscreen???
We don’t have white snowy Christmas’s here in OZ, we have bl**dy white hot ones!!!
The heat is normal for our area and BTW the hottest I have personally encountered is slightly above 48C. Oh yeah and we did drink beer without becoming dried prunes.
A bit late to the party here, but work commitments got in the way.
Geoff Sherrington,
300 days exceeding 40C over the historic record (122 yrs), gives an average of 2.46 days per year. 2009 had 12 days exceeding 40C, well in excess of the long term average. There were also an additional 5 days between 39C and 39.9C.
While the maximum temperature is not unprecedented, the fact that Adelaide had 12 days in excess of 40C is quite out of the ordinary.
Should today’s (Sunday) forecast prove accurate, that will leave us one short of the long term annual average with 355 days to go.
Patrick Davis,
You seem to have forgotten the extreme temperatures and bushfires in NSW during December. Also we still have seven weeks of Summer to go and it generally does not peak until late January – February. Don’t wager anything you can’t afford to lose.
Vote Quimby,
I live in an extremely fire prone area, and the local council for many years had issued notices to landowners to clear undergrowth and dead vegetation. Despite vegetation protection overlays, you can still be given a permit to remove trees.
Also, removal of vegetation around your property was no guarantee of safety on Black Saturday. Such is the random nature of fire that where one property was destroyed the adjoining property could remain relatively unscathed. Even properties situated in large cleared areas were destroyed. The culprit was radiant heat traveling well in front of the flames igniting houses long before the fire front arrived. Several CFA Captains I have spoken to over recent months have all made the same point.
As for this summer, December was about 2C above its long term average maximum. Remember summer doesn’t peak here until late January- February.
Amicus curiae,
Unless you use a calibrated thermometer in a Stevenson Screen, your temperature readings are useless for comparative purposes. As I stated earlier, December was warmer than average, and fortunately with a reasonable amount of rain. In fact our garden has had near tropical growth, our fruit trees are heavy with ripening fruit, and the lawn needs cutting every week. This time last year everything was dead. Give Peter Cundall a call I’m sure he will get your garden going again.
ShaneOfMelbourne,
PLEASE!!! If you are to comment about the fires then leave it to those that were in them…my family and I. We lost not only property but quite a few friends as well, fortunately not directly from our family but many neighbors that also live in this the bush that we love but are not allowed to touch due mostly to the extremist greenies that control the local council.
It is quite distressing to see that the same profile of the green movement seems to appear in the global warming debate – if you could call it a debate.
You make my blood boil when I read comments about the removal of vegetation and more so comments such as ‘Even properties situated in large cleared areas were destroyed’.
As was presented by many at the Royal Commission – of which I was one – due to the heavily fuel laden bush – that we are NOT allowed to touch – these so called houses that were in the cleared areas were rained upon (and I mean rained upon) by ember attacks that had a front of more than a kilometer.
As for vegetation removal it is none existent in our part of the country and the great news for us is that the local greeny activists are now replanting between the trees that were burnt and are regrowing. With unbelievable logic such as this, the next bonfire will be even bigger because the bush maybe twice as thick. I just hope that we wont have to drive through the 20-40m flames to get to safety next time.
I wish to finish by detailing to the many readers of this forum a short story of what these extremists a really like.
At one of the meetings with the Royal Commission, we had a lady and her daughter appear and explain how they lost their husband/father in the fire as he was trying to save their property which was surrounded by thick bush. My heart as did others went out for their loss and sorrow, BUT when I stood up to put forward my story and described how I and others would like to have more control of our properties by allowing at least cleaning if not clearing…to my amazement I WAS HECKLED by that same lady and her daughter saying that I should move and leave the area we don’t want you here etc etc…UNBELIEVABLE???
Isn’t it interesting how the profiles match, it’s frightening!
The BOM does provide some very interesting data for everyone to search and analyse.
My favourite is the rain fall figures for the Muray Darling Basin which all the pollies and the greenoids say is in drought.
Plus the Crimate Scientists at the CSIRO say the SE corner of Australia will dry out as AGO takes hold.
Well how do they explain this then,namely:
1.There has been no change in the rainfall pattern over the MDB in 110 years
2.If anything the trend is upwards.
http://reg.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/climate/change/timeseries.cgi?graph=rain&area=mdb&season=0112&ave_yr=11
The absence of water in the MDB is not caused by an absence of rain but managerial and political incompetence…. and more broken promises by Rudd and Wong and Garrett..not being prepared to standup to their Labour mates in NSW and Victoria.
Lupine in Oz
So I take it you are all for freedom of speech as long as it agrees with your point of view.
I had family and friends who were involved in the Ash Wednesday fires. They also lost friends and property.
As for Black Saturday, I am merely stating the comments from several CFA Captains I have spoken to over recent months who were there. They all stated the same thing: clearing of vegetation around properties was no guarantee against the fire.
If you object to the way your local council operates, stand for council yourself, and get elected. As I said, council here issues orders to clear undergrowth and from what I have seen, ours is one of your “greeny”councils.
I live in Adelaide.
Yesterday afternoon we went down to the beach – fish-n-chips, a walk along the sand. It was quite pleasant.
Away from the beach, its not very nice.
But a run of days over 40 degrees is quite normal through January and February. We’ve had runs like this of 10 days in a row – back in the 1970’s and 1980’s. Its NORMAL.
In fact, this is a short run, only 4 days over 39. YAWN. Nothing to see. Move along.
ShaneOfMelbourne
Exactly right, ‘Freedom of Speech’ and ‘Freedom to debate’, not to be heckled and suppressed from doing so.
I suggest you get yourself educated about councils in some of the fire prone areas. For example http://sosnews.org/bushfires/
BTW the CFA captains I have spoken to and know well have stated the same BUT you forget to mention the problems with the National Parks which burnt so much from so far away. National Parks that are not to be touched by us and are there just growing into ever larger bonfires for our next trip to hell.
On closing I hope you’re happy with the new rule that allows for additional clearing of trees around our properties. I wonder if you consider the new boundary of 10 metres (which was 9 metres) adequate for rural areas that have trees of 20 metres plus at that distance from houses?
Enough said by me, we are winning, our council CEO will no longer be with us this year. Contract has been canceled.
Ashleigh (20:15:25) :
I live in Adelaide.
Yesterday afternoon we went down to the beach – fish-n-chips, a walk along the sand. It was quite pleasant.
Away from the beach, its not very nice.
But a run of days over 40 degrees is quite normal through January and February. We’ve had runs like this of 10 days in a row – back in the 1970’s and 1980’s. Its NORMAL.
In fact, this is a short run, only 4 days over 39. YAWN. Nothing to see. Move along.
Hi Ashleigh,
I never knew that.
You must have had several runs in Adelaide of ten consecutive days over 40C from what you say. In the 70’s and 80’s.That is some sort of record isn’t it.
Would you please provide some back up to your claim, something from the BOM to prove your statement is correct. That would be great.
Thanks in advance.
Malcolm Hill,
If you use that page look at the mean temperature across the Murray Darling Basin you will find a significant cause of the decrease in water across the basin. As the temperatures ramp up we are seeing less and less run-off into the streams and rivers. (Although, admittedly you are right that the way the system is managed is having a severe impact also – in spite of long running refusal by politicians and industry bodies to accept that there was a limit to exploitation of the resource beyond which the system’s ecology would begin to collapse, along with the rural industries and and communities that are dependant on it.)
As for the current temperatures in Adelaide, it’s more informative if you put it in context. According to the Australian BOM:
# In 2009 the mean temperature was 1.3°C above average for South Australia as a whole, a record since the area averaged state figures begin in 1910. This is the 17th consecutive year that above average temperatures has occurred.
# Many locations around South Australia recorded record warmest nights in 2009 when averaged across the year as a whole.
# For Adelaide, 2009 was the equal warmest year with 2007, being 1.3°C above average for mean annual temperature, while several locations mainly inland, had warmest years on record.
# 2009 saw a very significant late January and early February heatwave event and the first spring heatwave for Adelaide as temperatures as a whole for November exceeded previous November temperature records by very significant margins. Temperatures were also very much above average in mid-August.
# Rainfall was generally near to slightly below average in 2009, with rainfall across the state as a whole 88 percent of the average for the year.
# After low summer rainfall, the remainder of the year tended slightly above average each month, apart from May, August and October. Growing Season (April to October rainfall) was slightly above average for this year, and the wettest since 2000.
# Temperatures for the decade from 2000 to 2009 averaged +0.9°C for the state as a whole, the warmest decade in the record, and continuing a steady increase in temperatures since the 1970’s. Rainfall across the decade, for South Australia, has been below average across the agricultural areas, particularly in the eastern districts, tending above average in the far west of the state.
The BOM’s Annual Australian Climate Statement 2009 is informative also
I am part of a small group who maintain( yes we pick up fallen limbs trim undergrowth) a tiny and precious, rare orchids and many birds, little reserve near the outskirts of our town. one tiny acre, near the dump ( a real fire issue) yet there are many who want it bulldozed!
while at the same time we have Massive Pine plantations on the other side of the fence/road from the reserve? and Blue gum plantations around the town also..
so who is the lunatic fringe here?.
Blue gums and pines ruin the already fragile sandy soils use precious water but make millions for investors..ie council too.
or
we who simply ask one tiny area be left to nature with Proper! care and consideration of fire issues.
I used to be able to say I was green orientated and be proud.
now I refuse to use that term, its sullied beyond repair.
mindful management is crucial not save the hwhatever at the cost of the loss of massive areas and animal as well as humans lives.
is brumbies eating saplings truly as harmful as wildfires due to undergrowth? I think not.
ps in Vic on a shaded breezy? porch its 44.9 now.
a tad warm.
“ShaneOfMelbourne (16:04:40) :
Patrick Davis,
You seem to have forgotten the extreme temperatures and bushfires in NSW during December. Also we still have seven weeks of Summer to go and it generally does not peak until late January – February. Don’t wager anything you can’t afford to lose.”
What extreme temperatures in December (I assume you are talking 2009)? There were less bush fires here in NSW during December 2009 compared to 2008, but almost all of the bush fires in NSW during December 2008 were started by lightening or arsonists.
Malcolm Hill (17:12:16) :
You say
1.There has been no change in the rainfall pattern over the MDB in 110 years
2.If anything the trend is upwards.
from
http://reg.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/climate/change/timeseries.cgi?graph=rain&area=mdb&season=0112&ave_yr=11
A river flows when there is water surplus to soil absorption. Looking at that link, the yearly maxima have decreased steadily from 700mm+ in the late 40’s,mid 50’s and the early 70’s. The average here is a poor indicator of actual river volume.
Each yearly maximum decreased from 700mm+ to the latest at about 400mm.
You are right in that politics has not helped, but I contend that the MD needs large rainfall events of 500-700mm annually to flow again properly, any figure below that goes underground,into the soil.
Keith Minto and Craig Allen
Thank you for your comments.
If you set the sliding bar to ” T” it will give a trend for the 110 years, and that is a positive trend upwards.
This just confirms what the 11 year rolling average says, namely that there is no downward trend for the MDB rainfall for the 110 years of records.
This is quitecontrary to the prounoucenments of the pollies who have blamed the lack of rain ..when that is not true.. as a trend.
Also the CSIRO has published several documents showing that the SE cnr of Australia is drying out..a statement that is not supported by the MDB data.
If you look at the rainfall over the past few years there is nothing unusual about that either.
But if you set the paramaters to ” anomalies” based upon the silly 1961-1990 base, then of course there are negative anomalies that do show up for these later years.But why do that, when you have 11O years of data to set a proper base line.
My guess is that the pollies and greenoids etc have been using the anomaly data and not the absolute measures, because by representing it this way they can get the picture they want.
Pick another baseline and get another picture..but you cant beat the full 100years and rolling average plus a least squares trend to get to the truth of the matter
I’ve just returned to KL after 3 weeks in Melbourne. Typical Melbourne weather -one morning, I crossed the road to walk in the sun to get my paper because it was so damn cold. I visited my sister in hospital and a cold change came through – heavy rain and a 12 degree drop in temperature in half an hour.
Three days of nearly 40 degs, 10 days of just above 20 (min just above 10). Average 25 as its been for the past 200 years.
Now I remember why I left Melbourne. Give me Montreal any day. At least I always have a pretty good idea what I`m going to face when I go outside.
From above,
The BOM historical record shows these maximum temperatures above 40 deg C for 10th Jan in these years (for Adelaide Airport since the 1950s)
1939 45.9
1999 41.9
1905 41.3
1927 41
2008 40.8
2007 40.5
1889 40.2
1991 40.2
Yesterday, 10th Jan 2010 was 41.0 deg C. Yes, it was hot.
All of these figures are subject to such UHI and adjustments as might have been applied.
The reason this is getting such big play down here in Oz is because last year we had horrendous bushfires. The AGW crew immediately blamed them on global warming, so the news media is very eager to play up the possibility that they will happen again. Apart from a couple of hot spells, we’ve had a mostly moderate summer in Victoria. I’ve been sleeping under a blanket for most of it.
Incidentally, fantastic book on the bushfires — “Inferno: The Day Victoria Burned.” It dismisses AGW as the cause of the fire, notes that the vast bulk of the 173 deaths were in an outer suburb of Melbourne, and that Green ratbags had turned what was once a safe area into a death trap by insisting that homes be surrounded wit h native vegetation, which goes up in flames if you look at it the wrong way.
Book proves conclusively that it was green “thinking”, not GW, that was the culprit.
Rosie,
the Victorian November 2009 average maximum was well above the long term average. December was above average as well. I slept under a blanket for most of it as well, nothing unusual in that.
Geography is not your forte. Kinglake and Marysville are not outer suburbs of Melbourne, they are rural towns.
Native vegetation has always grown in Australia, that’s why it’s called native. And it does burn fiercely. It has also been pointed out that many houses clear of vegetation were destroyed. They were ignited by radiant heat, long before the flames arrived. Others surrounded by native vegetation survived: such is the random nature of bushfires.
The people who live in those areas do so because they enjoy the bush but are well aware of it’s dangers. They chose to enjoy not destroy.
Many local councils also issue notices to clear fire hazards such as undergrowth and fallen trees etc.
And don’t forget we still have seven weeks of Summer to go.
Currently 44C here in Melbourne and fortunately no fires yet.
Snow and extreme low temperatures across three continents covering multiple weather systems in the Northern Hemisphere – that’s climate.
Extreme hot weather over Australia for a few weeks caused by a single weather system – that’s weather.
Simple as that really.
Can report that after yesterdays max of 42C we have had a nice cool change and rain this morning here in Adelaide – and the world did not end because of four or so days of heat. All is well in this part of the world!
This type of heatwave in Adelaide and Melbourne is the result of hot air coming from the north as a result of the cyclones in the Pilbara region, over 2500km away, and is usually followed by good rain. Snow forecast in the High Country next week.
Lets put the fires in Australia in perspective.
Watch this animation of global fires.
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/GlobalMaps/view.php?d1=MOD14A1_M_FIRE#
This begs the question, where does all that black carbon and smoke go and how do these fires impact climate? We know that smoke from burning is affecting the glaciers in the Himalayas, what else is all this fire doing. Do these fires produce cloud nuclei which in turn spawn hurricanes and cyclones? What if the burning patterns are disrupted? Is this some sort of feedback or amplification mechanism?
For example, this headline
Southern Africa: Weather Again Jeopardises Crop
1 June 2004
Johannesburg — Southern Africa’s crops and food supplies have again been jeopardised by late and erratic rains followed by floods.”
This seems to corrolate to the lack of fires detected over africa for that same period as seen in the animation.
Here is more fire and smoke research
http://www.newswise.com/articles/view/551839?print-article
I am no expert, but I bet this is not modeled in the IPCC reports.
Yes, 40+ C is hot but these kind of Summer temperatures are not out of the ordinary for most of Australia, not least Adelaide. If it was Tasmania or the wet tropics (eg Darwin, Cairns) then, yes, temperatures in the 40s would be unusual. But anywhere else it’s just part and parcel of an Australian summer. Extended periods of the these kinds of temperatures would certainly be unusual outside of the desert areas but a few consecutive days of temperatures over 40 (perhaps happening more than once over the course of a summer) is nothing unusual for most of Australia including Adelaide. In fact an Adelaide summer without a day in the high 30s or in the 40s would be unusual and something to write about.