More from the “weather is not climate department”.
Flurries hit southeast Australia as towns record their first-ever summer snowfalls
CANBERRA, Australia – Australia is following its second-hottest year on record with extraordinary snow flurries in its southeastern alpine region, where some towns have recorded their first-ever summer snowfalls.
Australia’s temperatures during the summer months of December through February can be uncomfortably hot even on its highest peak, Mount Kosciuszko, which stands a modest 7,310 feet (2,228 metres) above sea level.
Snow fell to 3,000 feet (900 metres) above sea level Monday in parts of New South Wales and Victoria states, Bureau of Meteorology senior forecaster Jane Golding said.
“Any time of year, it’s unusual to have snow down that far,” she said.
…
The town of Bombala in New South Wales, east of Kosciuszko, recorded its first summer snow since the bureau began keeping records there in 1965, Golding said.
The town of Cooma, also in New South Wales but north of Kosciuszko, recorded its first summer snow since records were first kept in 1973.
Cooma resident Krystal Pernitsch said the wind chill factor made Monday’s high temperature of 59 degrees (15 degrees Celsius) feel like 48 degrees (9 Celsius).
rbateman: “And furthermore, the Weather does NOT belong to GISS, NOAA, MET, IPCC or NCDC. These Johnny-come-latelys take a back seat to Man’s love of discussing the Weather, lately of which these Agencies have been misrepresenting in a very bad way.”
Extremely well said.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Kevin Kilty (17:33:26) :
Mike Ramsey (13:05:21) :
[snip] No, I live above 850hPa, and there are definitely clouds above me. Now we do radiate pretty effectively to space at night, and we also do so during the day as well, I’ll wager, but 850 hPA is not the upper end of convection.
In atmospheres, the convection zone is the lower part of the atmosphere where heat transport is primarily by convection. On the earth, water vapor makes transport by radiation in the lower troposphere less efficient. The earth’s atmosphere is semi-transparent to long wave radiation. The top of the convection zone is about 850 hPa. Above the convection zone you have the radiative zone where energy is transported by radiation.
I concede that my use of the phrase “cloud tops” might have been less than 100% accurate. 🙂
Intense cumulonimbus convection can push cloud tops above the conduction zone and into the radiative zone. However, as this air cools via radiation loss, it becomes cold and dry. This dry air subsides (sinks) reducing the upper troposphere specific humidity and thus increasing outbound long wave radiation (OLR) efficiency. So right at the cumulonimbus top, OLR is suppressed but in the much larger area surrounding the cumulonimbus cloud, dry subsidence increases OLR efficiency.
See the paper by William M. Gray, Professor Emeritus, Dept of Atmospheric Science, Colorado State University, titled “Climate Change: Driven by the Ocean not Human Activity” for more details.
Mike Ramsey
Phil M (18:41:48) :
Anthony and WUWT readers,
Even if thousands of people came to this blog and described the “weather” in their back yard, it wouldn’t even come close to describing global conditions. Every “weather is not climate” post I could find – every single one – tried to point out unusually cold temperatures at some location in the world. And yet . . . .
And yes, I have seen the link.
I really think Phil M, that the many readers on this site are well aware of the distinction between weather and climate. I cannot speak for Anthony but if I ran a popular blog and wanted to keep up the interest and not bore people stupid with the averaged abstraction that is climate, and if I wanted to include readership from all over the world, then I would include oddities of local weather occurring in your neck of the woods, right now. The ‘weather is not climate’ label does not appear to be a campaign to project local weather anomalies globally, at least not on this site.
I do not know where you live, but I appreciate my locality (35S,149E, 1964ft) being included in this fascinating, ongoing, indeterminate discussion.
To see snow showers on the Brindabella mountains (4100ft) this January morning was something I have not seen in my 40years in this location. Our average January max. is 27.7C with 2 days per month over 35C and average min. is 13C . This current welcome cool weather is all part of the rich tapestry of inland life, next week our inland summer temperatures will be ??
If you guys (Ramsey and Kilty, especially) are going to discuss convection zones, radiating heat, clouds, etc., at least state the altitude in feet so that the rest of us poor dumb laymen can follow along. Out of curiousity, what is “hPa” by the way? Finally, where can I find this paper by William Gray? He’s been a favorite of mine, he’s had the courage and the sense to speak out for quite a while on this subject. Is it understandable enough for the layman?
Steve K (09:34:39) :
K. Bray : “That’s what they claim the co2 does.”
Are you suggesting that CO2 is not a greenhouse gas? If that’s your point, then what’s your evidence?
Is it polyatomic?
This January seems very mild for Sydney. I recall plenty of hotter ones in the last few decades. I’m not sure what BOM are reporting, but I suspect their measurements will contradict my senses.
Can’t help wondering if Melbourne and Adelaide have been as hot as claimed. I wonder what fiddles are done there? Seems very odd to receive record-breaking summer snow in the mountains while also having Melbourne temperatures sufficiently steamy to warm those warmers’ hearts.
Phil M (18:41:48) :
The earth has been cooling for 5 years. There has been no warming since 1995.
Kevin Kilty (18:59:15) :
The reason I’d like Anthony to stop saying ‘weather is not climate’ whenever many cold records are broken is because the earth has been cooling for 5 years. Warming isn’t happening.
“warmest January day in UAH sat data”.
that was weather. weather is not climate 😉
rbateman (19:35:27) :
Phil M (18:41:48) :
No, I would not have Anthony cease the “Weather is not Climate Dept.”.
ya, leave it, after all the chihuahua trolls need an ankle to nip at
‘Like the iguanas in Florida, do they have koala falling down trees when it’s cold?’
No, because koalas are ~warm blooded~
Also second hottest year on record? Lol! Then why did I spend this entire summer wearing my winter clothes…except for maybe a week or so when it was moderately warm.
~ Jack, Australia
Magnus A (07:59:02) : So Australia have record hot …and snow. So, they were right all the time. The weather has become extreme. We didn’t listen!
Also CO2 causes a new ice age, due to scientists:
“Forget warming, greenhouse gases may trigger ice age” Aaaaaah!
But it’s a warm snow!! And so it will be a “warm ice age”. In fact, it will be the Hottest Ice Age in 12,000 years !!!! 😉
Steve K (07:35:52) : Oliver K. Manuel writes: “Beneath the tip of the Climategate iceberg is this emerging shadow of an unholy alliance of Politicians, Scientists, and Publishers – directed by a still invisible world government.”
What does this have to do with the weather in Australia?
Probably that the Australian BOM announced they’ve “recomputed” their temperatures… I went looking for a link to document this and could not find one though. Don’t remember where I saw it. So until a reference can be found I might have just confused them with some other country 😉
Phil M (18:41:48) : Can we please cease with the “weather is not climate” department?
NO! Not for a moment. Please! This is a blog by a weather guy that lists “weather” in the masthead as a major topic area. I’ve learned a great deal about how weather is driven by reading postings here and I’d like to learn more.
I’d rather ask “Can we please cease with the ‘Yet Another Troll Whining’ department?” The weather is highly interesting, while trolls are like fleas. You notice them, but not very much, and just wish they were eradicated.
Anyone who cares passionately about science (as you all appear too) should encourage Anthony to discontinue the “weather is not climate department”,
Anthony: Please Please Please continue to do the “weather is not climate” postings, but if you could add a note or two about the weather systems behind it that would be “way cool”. Is it the nino / nina, or the PDO, or the thinner atmosphere? Is it a well known collision of particular fronts? Or even just “They get this kind of thing when the stratocumulonimboFuzzyBall clouds hit a tropical Fisbin” ;-;
Thank you!
And if you get a chance, I’d love to see an article about the Jet Stream being “loopy” and is it more “flat” in one phase of the PDO and more “loopy” in another? The GIStemp tendency to ‘infill’ from 1000 km away could be seriously broken if the “baseline” from 1950-1980 was a “cold PDO” and then the “offsets” were applied 1000 km away during a “warm PDO” with a flat flow to the jet stream… or whatever the actual facts might be.
That kind of “primer on why” for the weather events would help me, at least, get a better handle on how things like GIStemp go so wrong…
Wow!
The Arctic has gone quite cold
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
Because of the power of the press, your average Australian thinks of the decade ended Dec 2009 as one of prolonged drought. It was, in a few unfortunate places. Overall, this last decade had the second highest rainfall nation-wide since 1900. See this official BOM graph.
http://i260.photobucket.com/albums/ii14/sherro_2008/Rainfallto2010.jpg?t=1263894865
I read that during the last heatwave that possums fell out of the trees:
http://www.theage.com.au/national/native-animals-just-fell-out-of-trees-during-heatwave-20100113-m6zq.html
I did some hiking on Mt Kosciuszko in 2001, probably 9 years ago to the day almost. There was no snow, it was hot and there were these huge flies that would be all over you and occsionally give you a nasty ‘bite’. Wish we had some snow then, I don’ t think the flies would have appreciated it.
I phoned a friend of mine who lives 30km south of Cooma. He confirmed that the temperature early Monday was about 32F (0c) for several hours and that snow fell for about 70 minutes and built up a light cover on the ground and trees. He let the dogs out to play in it for a while . Although snow falls are not rare there in winter this is the most significant snow event – and the only one in the memory of those living in the area to occur in mid summer. The temperture did warm up later in the day at their elevation of about 3100ft but the temperature at Thredbo ski resort (in the Alps to their west) only manged to make it to 34F.
Although weather – not climate, this is/was a significant weather event, just as the Melbourne heatwave was last year.
FTR I have seen a full cover of snow on Mount Kosc in mid summer and such an event does occur every few years, but snow down to the plains below is unheard of in mid summer.
BTW, those large flies are an annual event during summer, and no they don’t like the cold. I agree, the sting is nasty and they can go through denim jeans no problems. They are attracted to bright colours so jungle green is good.
Larry (21:28:24) :
If you guys (Ramsey and Kilty, especially) are going to discuss convection zones, radiating heat, clouds, etc., at least state the altitude in feet so that the rest of us poor dumb laymen can follow along.
http://www.tpub.com/content/aerographer/14269/css/14269_75.htm
Out of curiosity, what is “hPa” by the way?
1 pascal (Pa) = 1 N/m2 = 1 kg/(m·s2)
So a pascal is a measure of pressure (force per area). The higher up you go, the lower the pressure.
1 hectopascal (hPa) ≡ 100 Pa ≡ 1 mbar.
Finally, where can I find this paper by William Gray?
Google “Climate Change: Driven by the Ocean not Human Activity”
I found a PDF available on the web but I am not sure that it was a legal copy.
He’s been a favorite of mine, he’s had the courage and the sense to speak out for quite a while on this subject. Is it understandable enough for the layman?
Dr. Gray is a favorite of mine as well. He certainly has guts. The paper is fairly accessible. He does a top notch job giving a general review of AGW before going into how the oceans really control the climate. The general problem that experts have is knowing what the lay audience doesn’t know so that all the needed pieces are laid out and then built upon. IMO, the AGW review does a good job in this area.
Mike Ramsey
Sort of El Ninoesque, from the antipodal perspective. From summer heat to winter chill in a mere few weeks.
RE: yonason (07:46:53) :
Ah, yes. Entropy. The unstoppable destroyer.
There are blizzards in southern England, snow in the Aussie summer, mild weather in the Pacific NW, flash floods in the Middle East as I saw in the BBC today, greening in the Sahara. The comforting thing is that whether the climate eventually gets warmer or cooler thre are places to go. Greenland will be very pleasant in the heatwave, while Alice Springs would be great in the Ice Age. It’s just a matter of where to buy a few acres of currently useless land to set up my vineyards.
Mike Ramsey:
Thanks for the information. So, we are talking about an altitude that would be pretty close to Denver’s, for example. Well, I’ll follow along and try to learn more about this complicated subject.
Coldest minima on record in several southern Qld centres this week (5C at Stanthorpe) after a cool change. But that happens from time to time. Still b. hot here in NQ. All to do with which direction the wind blows from.