…because you might be accused of participating in conspiracy ideation. Here’s the premise from Dr. Roger Pielke Jr.:
The occasion for their update is a recent report by the Australian Climate Commission, a government body put established to advocate for action on climate change. The report — The Angry Summer — provides a tabulation of various weather records broken Down Under during the remarkable summer that has just ended. The report makes a number of very strong claims, including this one:
Australia’s Angry Summer shows that climate change is already adversely affecting Australians. The significant impacts of extreme weather on people, property, communities and the environment highlight the serious consequences of failing to adequately address climate change.
Bjørn Lomborg writes on his Facebook page
Normalized property damage in Australia 1966-2012. At least when it comes to property damage, climate has *not* made it an “angry summer”.
But clearly you’re not allowed to point this out, according to the Australian Climate Commission. (You can read their attack-heavy/data-absent comment here: http://climatecommission.gov.au/media-releases/correction-misrepresentation-the-angry-summer/)
The numbers are normalized by adjusting for changes in dwelling numbers and values and applying a building code adjustment to tropical cyclone losses, according to peer reviewed science.
You can see the article and graph here: http://theconversation.edu.au/weighing-the-toll-of-our-angry-summer-against-climate-change-12793
And hat-tip to Roger Pielke for putting the story in context:
http://rogerpielkejr.blogspot.com/2013/03/thou-shall-not-critique-australian.html
The sinister underbelly of the Climate Change Movement. Its all about: Fear and Loathing Of Humans, Greed, and Useful Idiot True Believers http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzXvJ73wJWc&sns=tw …
The latest “big scare” in Aus at the mo. Gillards “Proice ohn cahbon” has to be proven to be working, in a 1000 years (Thanks to Tim Flannery the AU$180k/pa part-time climate change adviser). The BOM, “developed new ways” of “measuring” (Read guestimating based on what I have seen so far) Australian averge temps, but no-one other than the BOM knows. And, what a surprise, we have the hottest summer EVAH! *sigh* Problem is, if people could be bothered, on the BOM website is all the data you need to falsify that claim.
Of course no one is allowed to publish the number of record minimums that occurred during the same period. That might be construed as balanced reporting.
So- the Summer was “angry”? Was it, perhaps, as “angry as an old man trying to send back soup at a deli”? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0u8KUgUqprw
Personally, I would have replaced the last two data points with “NaN” and deleted all the historical peaks. I would then have submitted a paper to Science and Nature. Michael Mann could then pretend to not review the paper.
Jo Nova has really done a good job on those claims here,
http://joannenova.com.au/2013/03/hottest-summer-record-in-australia-not-even-close-says-uah-satellite-data/
here,
http://joannenova.com.au/2013/03/mystery-black-box-method-used-to-make-all-new-australian-hottest-ever-records/
and here,
http://joannenova.com.au/2013/03/not-the-hottest-ever-summer-for-most-australians-in-sydney-melbourne-or-brisbane-not-extreme-heatwaves-either/
and Warwick Hughes here
http://www.warwickhughes.com/blog/?p=2152
Not sure that the people who’s homes and business burnt down, or the Queensland families who had their homes and businesses inundated by floods four times in a year would be much comforted by the fact that their property isn’t valued as high as the Sydney real estate that got damaged in the hail storm.
Still, if it makes you feel better…
Looking at Will Stefffen’s “Angry Summer Report,” one readily observes that it contains no proof whatever that Australia’s past summer has been influenced by GHG-induced climate warming. The Report is one long polemic decorated with facile arguments and orange-washed graphics.
Cook and lewandowsky are …. well….. wankers.
Another agency that requires closing to save the climate-haunted Australians money. They’ll need it all for flame retardant house paints, considering the coming heat.
An “angry summer?” So, Gaia is angry?
Truly, this is very primitive stuff.
For overseas readers, the BOM invented a new metric – which is a black box – that somehow computes average temperatures across this vast and varied continent. The result, we are told, is that last summer was the worst (hottest) ever, but since there were almost no Europeans here before 1800, and only a few million by 1900, it is not even a blink in the history of climate.
The BOM is running scared because the government that they have had a symbiotic relationship with in regard to climate panic is about to be thrown out on its ear. They and all the other carefully selected mouthpieces know that by the end of the year, the job ads will be their principal reading.
Meanwhile here in the Northern Hemisphere it remains cold. An angry winter perhaps?
How is it these morons keep telling us that climate change is happening and the effects are right now when by their own data climate change has been on hold for at least 16years???
People who conspire to claim that summers are angry make me furious.
People who conspire to prevent me from objecting to people who conspire to claim that summers are angry make me furious.
People who conspire to prevent me from objecting to people who conspire to prevent me from objecting to people who conspire to claim that summers are angry make me furious.
…
/sarc
I guess Mark is really furious now.
Perhaps he should put on his “Angry Trousers ans his Angry Jumper”, from a UK TV Advert.
All right, what did you Aussies DO? Surely you must have done something to PO the Summer. So, stop doing it.
Wow. Meanwhile, over in the UK, it looks like they might be setting up a media ‘ministry of truth.’ And over in Cypress, people who have savings accounts might get a small part of them taken away to pay for a bailout.
Hints of the future socialist utopia that awaits us?…
Guess I’m not climate scientist material. I don’t see an increasing trend. I seem to see some cyclic behavior on losses. Also, I thought one summer/winter/season was weather and you needed years and years to get to “climate.” Glad I stuck to chemistry because I’d never understand this climate magical stuff.
johanna says (March 19, 2013 at 9:42 am)
An “angry summer?” So, Gaia is angry?
—-
Yep. But a few small islands away, the volcano god is incandescent with rage.
I know being fair isn’t a priority of such institutions that have a mandate to deal with CAGW, even if it hasn’t been proven to exist. Hey if your job description is to report on the climate catastrophes, you certainly ain’t going to say there aren’t any. But, we have to be fair. If insurance losses wasn’t part of their analysis, then we should be trotting out temperatures, rainfall (what’s not to like about more rainfall in 90% of Australia), flood levels and frequencies historically. It isn’t impossible to have some records broken (but both ways would be a good metric). If climate is completely random, then new records should occur as frequently as Ln N, where N is the the number of years of the time series. E.g. a hundred year series should record ~5 records assuming the first year is a record. (realistically,it s unlikely for the first year to be a record so I would say the record has a maximum of~4 records. Note that if the time series is extended to 500 years, then Ln N ~6 records only (say maximum of 5, one more than the 100 year record. Of course, how random is it. There is a 60 year and other cycles (probably the largest we should be dealing with the puny period length of instrumental temps). We probably would be closer if we removed some “records” using the position in the 60 yr cycle of the temp taken in year 1. For example if the year is on a rising curve of 60yr cycle, we could take Ln N and subtract the records occurring before the peak of the first cycle. Thereafter, the high records should lie near the peaks of the 60yr curve and low records near the trough.
Patrick says:
March 19, 2013 at 8:55 am
I am very sad that Australia has suffered so very much at the hands of the Alarmists but I am really enjoying learning to speak Aussie. Your method of “phonetic” spelling is excellent.
cui bono says:
March 19, 2013 at 10:49 am
johanna says (March 19, 2013 at 9:42 am)
An “angry summer?” So, Gaia is angry?
—-
Yep. But a few small islands away, the volcano god is incandescent with rage.
*
Got any virgins?
So let’s see, CO2 increases at 2 ppm a year. Wow this is a sensitive climate titration – 2ppm less and things are basically okay; add 2 ppm and we get fried and deluged in Australia! Meanwhile, the rest of the world went the other way. Maybe these Aussies had better double the carbon tax and shut down half their industry. I didn’t know they were such woeful changers of climate.
A C Osborn says:
March 19, 2013 at 10:17 am
I guess Mark is really furious now.
—————
Recursively so.
I forgot to add my disclaimer; should my post be used in some future study of recursive fury, I am voluntarily self identifying as a bot rather than a human at this time.
Australian columnist Andrew Bolt writes about the mess:
“How dare the Climate Commission complain at being caught out
The Commission press release … explains that in the “Angry Summer” report when they said impacts to property they were actually referring to unspecified and unquantified impacts to property other than those related to economic costs. Please.
I repeat: sack the Climate Commission now. We deserve science, not spin. ”
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/how_dare_the_climate_commission_complain_at_being_caught_out/
Can you buy Carbon Credit Vouchers as Christmas Gifts inside Christmas cards
Trade them in for a Track Day in a Ferrari
Here in the UK of course Gaia is “somewhat upset”. Stiiff upper lip old boy don’t ya know.
In reply to:
A C Osborn says:
March 19, 2013 at 9:23 am
Jo Nova has really done a good job on those claims here,
http://joannenova.com.au/2013/03/hottest-summer-record-in-australia-not-even-close-says-uah-satellite-data/
here,
http://joannenova.com.au/2013/03/mystery-black-box-method-used-to-make-all-new-australian-hottest-ever-records/
and here,
http://joannenova.com.au/2013/03/not-the-hottest-ever-summer-for-most-australians-in-sydney-melbourne-or-brisbane-not-extreme-heatwaves-either/
and Warwick Hughes here
http://www.warwickhughes.com/blog/?p=2152
William:
It does appear the BOM manipulated the Australian temperature data to create a record high average Australian temperature to provide material for what appears to be a propaganda department.
Quoting from Joanne Nova, see link above.
“This summer the Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) invented a whole new metric to measure average national heat, which might be all very well except no-one (other than the BOM) seems to know what it is.
On January 7th the BOM claimed Australia set a new “average maximum daily temperature record”. Now the headlines are about the “hottest” Australian summer.
With both records, no one outside the BOM team has access to the methods or data. This post is about the new “daily” temperature of Australia used to declare Jan 7th was a record, but the same point applies to the “hottest summer” records, even though they may be a different data set. Where is the data? Where are the methods?
Is the BOM a science agency or a PR bureau?
How many thermometers have 100 year records? Just 16.
The brutally simple average of all the temperatures recorded at 721 weather stations on Jan 7th was 35.1C, not 40.3C. The extra 5 degrees is produced by a form of area weighting to average the thermometers over the entire nation. Most thermometers are located on the cool outside edge of Australia, not the hot middle of the country where hardly anyone lives. So there are not many thermometers with long records to average across the center.
The BOM team, quite realistically, needs to make up for the non-random way those thermometers are placed. But there are many ways to “average” the numbers and different datasets to use (like HQ, ACORN, AWAP). No-one suggests that the BOM ignored the 382 cooler stations within the 721 known to the audit team, but the average of the hottest 339 stations is 40.3C. Curious.”
Martin says
Not sure that the people who’s homes and business burnt down, or the Queensland families who had their homes and businesses inundated by floods four times in a year would be much comforted by the fact that their property isn’t valued as high as the Sydney real estate that got damaged in the hail storm.
Still, if it makes you feel better…
Do we have to value things according to your priorities now then? How very “climate science” (TM). That is, make up values according to what you think they should be rather than what they are.
Sydney houses can go for ten times what one in the northern bush might go for. That’s just a fact of life. Regretting it doesn’t make it untrue. “Feeling better” doesn’t really come into it.
Your real problem, presumably, is you don’t like the fact that the recent disasters are less disastrous than they are being purported to be. Are you commiserating with the Queenslanders, or you are peeved that the summer wasn’t actually that angry?
Others have noted the title “Angry Summer” in relation to Gaia and as a demonstration of the primitive.
Whilst the first (or continuing) response may be to be amused or bemused, it is overtime to actually look at these sorts of things seriously.
Tim Flannery recently, I think in some manner in reference to this publication or at around the same time, referred to the atmosphere as a “sensitive organ”.
Forget the attempt to fit such beings into categories such as poor/incompetent scientist, or noble cause victims.
These are actually beings that do not qualify as fully human. I mean that in all seriousness. To be homo sapien is not equivalent to being human. Humanity has characteristics distinct from the functioning of an organism.
These do not include the compulsion to reduce by generally unspecified means the world population by a dramatic amount as is actually the desire of a significant part of these beings.
They do not include the abasement of human capacity to a degree required to live in a manner subservient to unknowable physical forces directed by an inconceivable power completely unrelated to human experience.
These being have separated themselves by whatever means from humanity. They intend to impose their will on humanity and effectively destroy it.
They do so for their benefit as they see it.
In the past they would have been described as evil.
Whether that is preferred to primaeval does not matter, it is the same thing.
It is time to stop seeing these beings as misguided or opportunistic in an ordinary way. They are something altogether different. And they are a threat to humanity.
Meanwhile, the Australian government is making plans to place restrictions on freedom of the press
http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/media-changes-may-breach-human-rights-laws-committee-20130319-2gd4k.html
The newspapers might be less willing to criticize government agencies is this proposed legislation passes.
We are fortunate to have the first amendment here.
If it’s permitted to post such things here, this reminds me of an particularly good Iowahawk piece:
http://iowahawk.typepad.com/iowahawk/2010/04/top-scientists-warn-sea-gods-angry.html
PEW!
Oh, my – today, I had a strongly worded discussion in the forum of SPIEGEL.DE, which claims to be THE german investigative news mag, about the actual state – or. rather: non-state – of Gobal Warming, Climate Change, Climate Disruption (you name it)…
I was named everything from braindead idiot to criminal liar – while – Here! Here! – the forum’s mods DID NOT silence me in the course of the raging, hour-long digital battle.
Miles to go, before I sleep, friends. But step by step, the cold truth (pun intended) seems to be raising her head, at last…
“The report draws upon the latest research by bodies including CSIRO, Bureau of Meteorology, and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change ”
————————————————————————————————————
I wasn’t aware that the IPCC did any research, I thought they were a selective collating service?
@RHL –
Sounds very much like the censorship being carried on here in the US by our news media and the Obully Administration.
And among other “benefits” of the Australian carbon tax are 10 times as many business failures as before the tax, due toi the increases in energy costs. Oh, but those 25,000 jobs destroyed by the tax had to be sacrificed for “the Cause.” One can only assume the Australian Climate Commission will salivate more than ever when people start droipping dead because they can’t afford to air-condition their homes during an “angry summer.” Mass murder, here we come
The only thing I can see ‘angry’ about the summer just gone is our lousy cricket team.
(insert appropriate smilie here)
The Oz C Commission and parts of the BOM are just blantant bloated propaganda arms of the current Federal Government. Equivalent to the Yes Minister Series hospital without patients. The CC needs to be closed down this September and the BOM shaken up. They have lost all credibility in my opinion with their weasel reporting.
@T-Bird –
Your link provides proof, if ever there were any doubt of it, that CAGW is religion and not science.
mogamboguru says:
March 19, 2013 at 1:00 pm
“I was named everything from braindead idiot to criminal liar – while – Here! Here! – the forum’s mods DID NOT silence me in the course of the raging, hour-long digital battle. ”
Der Spiegel has delegated warmism from their political machine to Bojanowski. The political machine will therefore not use it anymore. The followers will soon notice and hop on the new bandwagon. Maybe anticapitalistic; or maybe the Bilderbergers and CoR need their propaganda machine to save the EU now.
I can see the benefit in replacing the obsolete concept of “temperature” with “angriness” while dealing with climate. The latter is measured in whatever way you see fit, while the former one by unyielding thermometers.
/sarc off
The very term ‘Angry Summer’ is pure ‘advertising’ or PR. (Indeed it would be interesting to see if paid professionals came up with it.)
In literary terms it is a good example of what we call ‘personification’, in that it contains and conveys the implication that the ‘Summer’ like a person, has ’emotions’, is aware of ‘our bad behaviour’ and is responding. A bit like Gaia.
This document/campaign is targeted at young, ill educated people (who are the last prize to play for in this game) and I would have to say that up to a point it works. It’s catchy, resonant and has got public attention. However it highlights the ever more infantile and magical nature of ClimateThink.
In the early days of the Climate Hoax I was asked by a London PR company to provide written material for a PR awareness raising campaign. Thankfully I didn’t get the job!
I’m a KIWi and don’t follow Aussie politics AND this is kinda OT. I heard on the radio this morning that Gillard is very unpopular with the public and that the public want Rudd to lead the party. However what the public want is unlikely to happen because there is a strong core in the ruling Gillard’s Labor Party that wants to keep Gillard in power AND its in the best interests of Tony Abbot (the leader of the opposition Liberal Party) to keep the very unpopular Gillard as leader. Seems to me a very fine example where politics usurps the democratic process.
In Brisbane I thought it was a terrific summer. Thankfully I’m living high up on a hill, not like the idiots living on a natural floodplain, wondering why it floods.
Of course its not really their fault – despite strenuous denials, the CSIRO prediction that Australia would be “hotter and drier” was not only used to justify the white elephant desalination plants, it was also used by unscrupulous developers and councils to build houses in what were effectively dry river beds. So when heavy rain hit, the river came back, and washed away everything in its path.
Lunatic environmentalism in government also played a part – Peter Garrett, the socialist serial incompetent who is now in charge of Australian education, was in charge of environment policy before the floods, and vetoed several flood mitigation measures on the grounds it would kill a few fish. http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/peter-garrett-on-why-he-rejected-the-traveston-dam/story-e6frerdf-1225796586203
What the Aussies need is an Angry Election Season where they boot the chuckleheads out of office, followed by an Angry Administration where all of the usual (and useless) suspects from the pro-carbon tax wing of the government are returned to civilian life.
Horse Hockey Sticky.
I am sure that Lewandowsky and Cook will join the chorus of criticism. After all, they begin The Debunking Handbook with
Then again, the real intention of this work might be the corruption of science.
There are only for levels of ‘alarm’ in Oz:
1. No worries.
2. She’ll be right.
3. Strewth, we may have to cancel the barbie!
4. We had to cancel the barbie!
To date, level four has never been reached.
(full apologies and sympathy in advance to all those who lost property and even more this last year, this is only a joke)
A recent poll of scientists revealed 97% believe that the angriness is unprecedented and mostly caused by man. Another science settled.
Regarding a few comments about the current political climate here, Labor are history in the federal parliament just like the are in all state parliaments so far. Add for Gillard, what a bloody fool trying to restrict the actions, or even ownership, of the press just a few months before the election! That had to be a ‘D’oh’ moment if ever the was one. She is being crucified, and I am happy to watch it.
Criticism of the Angry Summer Report provokes an Angry Authoritarian Retort.
Nolo Contendere, rest assured, on the current polls this dishonest and incompetent government will be no more within 2 hours of the closing of the polling places later this year.
Pete McMartin of the Vancouver Sun calls us all the D word in today’s paper:
http://www.vancouversun.com/technology/Cherrypicking+fruitless+debate/8118451/story.html
This episode is an excellent example of government propaganda masking as science, at it’s most blatantly stupid, unscientific and pig-headed.
Climate commission makes a statement about longer term effects of climate change, but without any long term data to back it up. Someone points out there is no long term trend in the data. Climate commission responds by saying that they didn’t present any long term data, and therefore can’t be wrong about it. They also claim that it is unscientific to respond to such statements by presenting long term data, when they haven’t. They also claim they are accused of actually doing science, by presenting long term data (when there is no such accusation), when they haven’t done the science and haven’t presented it. They then present a few, brand new selected long term trends, and by their own words then commit their own false accusation and become unscientific by actually doing and presenting the science.
This is what government sponsored propadanda does to people’s minds.
OZ climate has changed dramatically and shows it is very responsive.
It will change again when elections are held later this year.
Cannot get over the drama in this “Angry Summer” story:
Primarily anecdote full, and where actual bested records are listed, it is very hard to get a picture of a suddenly altered climate. The very fact that records of years, decades or even a century ago are now being matched or bettered surely tells us more about the variability of the planet than it does of “sudden and dramatic change”.
Records recently bested occurred in years (where shown) listed in “the story”:
1972, 1972, 1939, 2006, 1890, 1896, 1981, 2011, 1979, 1958, 2011, 2007, 1976, 1920, 1968, 2006, 1992.
There’s a sponsored group in Australia called “Risk Frontiers” who do research for the insurance industry. They’ve been providing the normalized data which is getting the warmies’ knickers in a knot. They really deserve a hat-tip too.
They wrote this at our government funded academic love-in ‘The Conversation’.
http://theconversation.edu.au/weighing-the-toll-of-our-angry-summer-against-climate-change-12793
Wasn’t received very favourably but that’s expected at that site..
We now see the final descent of the climate movement into the primitive mindset of the early humans, who believed that ‘the gods are angry’ and demanded sacrifices to appease them.
The ‘angry summer’, we are supposed to believe, is caused by wicked humans angering Gaia, so we must make sacrifices to appease them.
Perhaps we could all ‘chip in’ a bit and buy some Anger Management sessions for the Summer?
Or, heck, just pass a law that any summer, found by the BOM to be “angry” must attend Anger Management session or it will not be allowed a passport…
(I think someone at the BOM has had too many “creative writing / advertizing” classes and not enough statistical analysis work…)
“Gary Pearse says:
March 19, 2013 at 11:17 am”
The carbon price started at $23/tonne CO2(e) (Starting 1st July 2012), escalating annually by 2.5% plus consumer perice index (CPI or inflation if you like) for a three year period. So the tax will increase this year and next until an ETS is setup.
The Aussie ETS was to merge with the New Zealand (NZ) ETS and then merge with the EU ETS. I don’t see that happening at all. We know the extent of the ETS has been scled back in NZ. We know the EU ETS is worthless and going nowhere apparently. With the likely change of federal Govn’t set for September 14th (Very likely to be sooner than that). Many businesses have shut shop and gone offshore. Recently the CEO of Virgin Australia (Airline) said they poor profits were due to strong competition and the burden of a AU$23mil additionla fuel expense directly attributed to Gillards “proice ohn cahbon” which cannot be passed on in the tight market. Of course, in the carbon tax legislation, if you make claims to your customers that price increases are due to the carbon tax you’d be fined AU$1.1mil. So far, as far as I know, no fine has been enforced.
“Theo Goodwin says:
March 19, 2013 at 11:06 am”
LOL! I try to give an impression of our PM, she is not well respected in Australia, contrary to what MSM polls say. She is originally from Wales, UK, and if you said she spoke “Aussie” in a pub here, you’d be de-bagged, tared and feathered and rightly so. Gillard is from a small town called Barry. Barry island is where oild boilers (Steam engines) go to ge scrapped. Most Aussies I know here just wish she’d go back from where she came.
Our voice will be heard on the 14th September (Probably sooner if the Labor party caucus “knife” her, as she did Rudd, for the top job).
Angry Summer? That was the one several years ago in southern Tasmania when we were were told it had been “the hottest summer ever” and none of us could remember having a summer. One day over 30C and most days in the mid-teens does not make “the hottest summer ever”. This summer just ended may well have been “the hottest summer ever”, but why in god/shiva/buddha/lao-tsu’s [delete whichever is inapplicable] name would we be angry? Because we could dine al fresco without goose bumps? Because all of our warm weather crops were bountiful? Because the pretty young girls wore even skimpier clothing than they usually do? Because we could throw a few prawns on the barbie without needing to take them indoors to eat? The lunatics are definitely in charge of the asylum!
Of course Gaia is angry. !!
We have a bunch of moronic sycophants trying to starve her/him/it of desperately needed CO2 !!
@markx
yep, down here, we are finally reaching the max temps of many (70, 100 or more) years ago, after all the warming we have apparently had, and all the urban heat additions.
Quite amazing that it has taken so much so-called warming to do this. !
As far as I know the Sydney hailstorm didn’t actually damage land values. I was there when it happened. I lived through it. And I think I had exactly the same area of property before it as after it. I did have to replace my roof though. That would have been cheaper in Sydney then wherever in country Queensland, purely if only because the roofing material would be closer to the point of origin.
johanna says:
March 19, 2013 at 4:45 pm
Nolo Contendere, rest assured, on the current polls this dishonest and incompetent government will be no more within 2 hours of the closing of the polling places later this year.
————————-
We in the US we thought the same way.
We figured wrong.
All it takes is lots of money and a population begging to be saved and it’s over.
Good luck!
cn
“peterg says:
March 20, 2013 at 3:45 am”
Talking about hail, and apart from real hail and damage as a result, after the big storms in Sydney at least a few years back, insureres quickly “sussed” out fraudulent claims. They found that every “dent” was “exactly” the “same”. Many “claimants” had access to a ball pein hammer, that “matched” the dents in the cars. All dents! And Aus is called the smart country?
That reminds me of that old joke about the two Aussies who show up at the Pearly Gates.
Tony Abbott will soon be Prime Minister of Australia. A clear part of his mandate from the people of Australia will be to cut the green-left activist agenda out of Australian science funding. The current onslaught of ‘climate change’ rubbish you are being subjected to reflects a desperate last ditch attempt to increase support for the green-left Gillard-Milne government.
Off hand I would say the major damage from the hailstorm was the tile roofs. Most Sydney houses have tile roofs. Hail the size of a grapefruit tends to destroy them. Moreover, the roof no longer keeps out the rain, as opposed to corrugated iron which though requiring replacing, still kept one dry. I doubt many people took to their tile roofs with pein hammers.
Its odd how some in country Australia belittle anything that might occur to someone in a capital city. The ABC radio announcer the night of the hailstorm was a country guy who refused to pass on any information about the hailstorm, on the basis that when hail hit anywhere in the country, warnings were not generally broadcast in metropolitan areas, so why should he interrupt his show with warning people about getting their cars undercover in Sydney.
Reblogged this on The GOLDEN RULE and commented:
I hope at least some of the Australian public get to see and understand this.