This is the gateway page to Australian surface data in a format ready to feed into Digital Atmosphere. Digital Atmosphere is Tim Vasquez's excellent and inexpensive program for plotting and analysing real-time raw weather data readily available on the Net.

25 Nov 2003	Synops now carry rainfall data for the past 3 hours at all observations except the local 9am obs, which is for 24 hours. Because DA and the international rainfall code has no provision for a 3-hour rainfall reporting period, I use the 1-hour reporting period.
12 Nov 2003	A change to internal coding procedures within the Bureau of Meteorology has produced incorrect rainfall data in synoptic reports over the past few weeks. In most cases it has led to the reporting of a trace of rain when in fact none fell. This has been corrected in reports from 0000z 12 November 2003. Metar reports are unaffected.

Latest data

Hourly METARS (updated about 15 and 45 past the hour)
SYNOPS (update about 15 and 45 past the hour)
- Also available in global files from DuPage and FSU, and (curiously) in the global buoy data from Albany. You need to look in the non-standard hour bulletins, such as 01 and 02UTC, to find most of the reports, most of which begin with the header SNAU rather than the more standard SMAU or SIAU.

I no longer provide data for ships, buoys or upper air, but the following links have global files:

SHIPS
- The daily ship collective from SCRIPPS is the most concise way to get Australian area data. Ship reports are also filed with land surface reports by DuPage and FSU, and with buoy data from Albany. those for the Australian region having the header SMVE.
BUOYS
- As with ships, use the daily buoy collective from SCRIPPS.
UPPER AIR
- Use Dupage, FSU or Albany. Albany has a particularly long archive.

Notes about the data

Note that my treatment of some rainfall data is non-standard, but achieves a useful end.

The WMO rainfall code (international exchange) is the 6 group -- 6rrrtR, where rrr=rainfall in mm and tR=hours covered by the rainfall in rrr * 6. So 60021=2mm over 6 hours. The code, therefore, doesn't allow reporting for periods of less than 6 hours. However, Australian synop obs report 3-hourly rainfall at all observations except 9am local time (22 or 23UTC in the east, 01UTC in the west), and I calculate hourly rainfalls for AWS's in the metar obs.

DA both plots and analyses hourly rainfall, and I discovered that I can fudge this by setting the tR figure to 5 (haven't spent the time to work it out, but it does work.)

Therefore:

If you are plotting or analysing synop data which contains 3-hourly rainfall observations (which is all except 9am local time), set plotting/analysing preferences to *hourly* rainfall but remember it is really 3 hours!

If you are plotting or analysing any metar data, set plotting/analysing preferences to *hourly* rainfall and you will get the rain in the past hour!

In summary:

Synop data for 9am local time always carries precip for the past 24 hours: set precip to 24
Synop data for all other times always carries precip for the past 3 hours: set precip to 1
Metar data for all times carries precip for the past hour: set precip to 1

Useful DA files:

This plr file gives Australian state borders. Copy it to your \digatm directory (save the old one first in case...) and use Map > Add Custom Overlay to add it to basemaps before saving them.
This slz file allows DA to download your selection of current and past hour synops and metars, and current day upper air, buoy and ship data files from the AusDigatm site. It then automatically imports the data ready for plotting and analysing. I've retained the links from Tim's original slz file that are relevant to Australia. Copy the file to your \digatm directory (save the old one first in case...). To make use of it, open DA when you are online, click Internet > Retrieve Data, then tick the items you want. The items all download into a file called incoming.txt in your \digatm\data directory, then automatically import into DA. Note: If you find that you are getting metar or synop data for the wrong hour, check your computer clock. If it is correct, try unticking (or ticking) the "adjust for daylight time" box on the General tab of Preferences in DA.
Revised DA station list as at 7/9/01.

Links:

Digital Atmosphere
Codes and data
- Meteorological data page on AWN
- WMO operational information
- BoM site lists (updated weekly, ~2.5mb)

Problems or questions? I can be emailed on this link.

Laurier Williams

Important: The data on this site comes from the Australian Bureau of Meteorology. To the best of my knowledge, the Australian data falls within the Bureau's Basic Product Set, and as such is available to be freely disseminated subject always to being accompanied by an acknowledgement of the Bureau as data provider. If you use this data, please follow this requirement. I believe that International ship reports are free for redistribution under WMO Resolution 40. All data is provided as received and processed, with no quality control checking. The datastream is automated, using a 256k ISDN permanent connection, however there are no guarantees of continuity or reliability of service.