|
 TAS: Record warm
spell finishes with a bang
With overnight temperatures in the mid to high teens over the past few nights,
Taswegians have been throwing off the doonas in droves. Some notable records
fell ahead of a cool change that crossed the island and swept around the SE
AUS coast today.
The
warm
spell
began
on
Monday
when,
after a cold night, daytime temperatures rose
2
to 6C
above
average.
Since
then,
minimum
and maximum temperatures have risen to be 6 to 10 above normal yesterday
and this morning. While the only high maximum record to fall was a 21-year
one
at Tarraleah yesterday, several significant high minimum temperature records
have been broken. Hobart City's minimum of 16.2 yesterday beat the previous
May record of 16.1 set on 2 May 1889, just 7 years after observations began.
Hobart Airport also set a new record yesterday morning with 15.2 beating the
1982 record of 15.1. The Airport notched the record up again this morning with
a minimum of 16.0. Grove, just north of Huonville, was even more balmy this
morning, its overnight low of 17.7 a whopping 13.5 above average and well over
the 45-year record of 15.7.
Mild conditions returned with a bang across the island as a front swept through
around dawn giving gusts to 117km/h on Maatsuyker Island and Mt Wellington
summit, and 113km/h at Scotts Peak Dam in the South West.
 Macquarie
Island "mildwave" ends in a record
Heat from the mainland has penetrated far to the south. Sub-Antarctic Macquarie
Island, 1550km SSE of Hobart, has recorded close-to-record temperatures over
the past three days, and finally set a new high May maximum of
10.0C today, it's "hottest" May day in 57 years. Temperatures on the island,
situated in the middle of the Southern Ocean halfway between New Zealand and
Antractica, rarely vary more than a few degrees from normal. The May average
maximum is 5.8 and the highest and lowest May temperatures recorded have been
9.6 and -1.7. The maxima since Monday have been 9.0, 8.5, 9.4 and 10.0 and
the
mets at the weather station are likely to have been looking for the esky and
bottles of sunscreen. The May average minimum is 2.4 and the highest recorded
7.2,
so the run of 5.6, 6.2 and 6.7 over the past three days didn't quite make it.
SA, NSW, ACT:
Heat persists
Well above average temperatures contracted into inland NSW and SA today as
cooler air surged over southeastern coastal areas behind a front. However,
locations in the red area on the maximum temperature anomaly map all reached
top temperatures 8 to 10 above average, with many locations coming within a
degree of their May records. These included Andamooka 31.5 (record 31.8 in
36 years), Hawker 28.8 (29.4, 38 years), Canberra Airport 23.9 (24.5, 66 years)
and Kosciuszko Chalet at Charlotte Pass 16.0 (16.2, 18 years).
WA:
Heavy thunderstorm falls in central WA
Northwesterlies continue to bring warm, moist tropical air into the state
and today were accompanied by strong middle atmosphere uplift caused by a divergent
jetstream above. Heavy rain fell from thunderstorms that developed in the Murchison
and western Goldfields during the afternoon. Leinster, 350km NNW of Kalgoorlie,
recorded
41.8mm between 3 and 5pm, 21.0 of which fell in 24 minutes to 4pm. Their
24 hour
to 9am
Friday
total was 77.2, supplemented by a further 22mm between 6pm and midnight this
evening. Other substantial 24 hour totals were 32.6 at Bulga Downs and 43.8
at Yeelirrie. In the Murchison, storms continued through much of the day and
overnight. Meekatharra steadily accumulated 36.6 in the 24 hours to 9am Friday,
while Tuckanarra, 75km SW, recorded 82.0 and Wiluna, 170km E, 44.6. |
