Gales
batter entire southern coastline
Victorians
and South Australians battle bushfires, duststorms as temperature records
fall |
 Six-hourly surface analyses from 12UTC (10pm EST) 14 September to 00UTC (10am EST) 16 September. BoM |
In an unusually widespread meteorological event today, strong to gale force winds scoured the entire southern coastline of the continent, from its most southwesterly point at Cape Leeuwin to its most southeasterly on Tasman Island. A deepening low of 980hPa in the Great Australian Bight and strengthening highs of over 1030hPa both to the west of Perth and east of Sydney made for beautiful symmetry as well as strong pressure gradients along 4,000km of coastline. Take a look at the list of high wind speeds and wind gusts in today's National Weather Extremes below to see the extent and uniformity of this event.
The strongest winds today were in southern SA and western Victoria. The full report is given in the news for 16 September.
More than 50 fires broke out across country Victoria today, with a further 120 in the Melbourne metropolitan area. Northerly winds gusting to 80 to 100km/h accompanied low humidity and record September temperatures to fuel the grass, scrub and forest fires. The largest, a 225ha blaze in a pine plantation at Mt Lanarch near Beaufort, 45km WNW of Ballarat, was still out of control late this evening, though all other fires had been contained. Almost 20 of the fires were in the Bendigo area. In South Australia, the Country Fire Authority responded to 300 calls, the worst an 80ha fire in Wirrabarra Forest near Port Germein, and a 30ha forest and scrub fire at Delamere on the Fleurieu Peninsula. In a parched band of country from the Victorian Mallee and Wimmera across to South Australia's Eyre Peninsula, duststorms were frequent. Severe duststorms were reported from Mildura, with visibility on the Sturt Highway to Renmark reduced to a few metres. In Melbourne, the temperature reached 28.5° late afternoon, the highest maximum ever recorded so early in the year. Cranbourne Botanic Gardens, 45km SE of Melbourne, and Weeaproinah in the Otway Ranges to the city's southwest both set new September records, as did Wynyard Airport on Tasmania's north coast.