NZ?Australian Weather

[nzmaninsydney]

Melbourne has already exceeded its average December rainfall, currently 79mm has fallen compared to the average of 59mm. Getting more winds than normal from the West-South-West with a high of 20 degrees expected for Melbourne tomorrow and Sunday with showers and strong south-westerlies. (Sound familiar Kiwis?-very similiar to the December you had last year).

Have been following the weather in Invercargill via stuff.co.nz, they've had many days over 21 degrees, with night time temperatures being warmer as well, it wouldnt surprise me if they had thier warmest December on record.

Invercargill recorded 230mm of rain last December. To date they've only recieved 18.8mm. Last December, they only had 136 hours of sunshine, to date they've recorded 101 hours.

[Gary Roberts]

Melbourne has already exceeded its average December rainfall, currently 79mm has fallen compared to the average of 59mm. Getting more winds than normal from the West-South-West with a high of 20 degrees expected for Melbourne tomorrow and Sunday with showers and strong south-westerlies. (Sound familiar Kiwis?-very similiar to the December you had last year).

Have been following the weather in Invercargill via stuff.co.nz, they've had many days over 21 degrees, with night time temperatures being warmer as well, it wouldnt surprise me if they had thier warmest December on record.

Invercargill recorded 230mm of rain last December. To date they've only recieved 18.8mm. Last December, they only had 136 hours of sunshine, to date they've recorded 101 hours.

If only we had credible records beyond the last few decades.

[TonyT]

If only we had credible records beyond the last few decades.

Um, we do.

[Gary Roberts]

If only we had credible records beyond the last few decades.

Um, we do.

Really?

[saaaab]

Melbourne has already exceeded its average December rainfall, currently 79mm has fallen compared to the average of 59mm. Getting more winds than normal from the West-South-West with a high of 20 degrees expected for Melbourne tomorrow and Sunday with showers and strong south-westerlies. (Sound familiar Kiwis?-very similiar to the December you had last year).

Have been following the weather in Invercargill via stuff.co.nz, they've had many days over 21 degrees, with night time temperatures being warmer as well, it wouldnt surprise me if they had thier warmest December on record.

Invercargill recorded 230mm of rain last December. To date they've only recieved 18.8mm. Last December, they only had 136 hours of sunshine, to date they've recorded 101 hours.

Melbourne has been getting cold fronts every bloody 2-3 days and we can only manage 1 day at a time above 30c because the cold fronts are so frequent. yet somehow the average max temp is 1c above normal but nights are around average or less.

[RWood]

Um, we do.

Really?

Invercargill has longterm records, including sunshine data back to 1932 (and older but dubious data even earlier)

[TonyT]

Um, we do.

Really?

Yes.

I grant you not a huge number of stations, but there is enough data which has been carefully quality controlled going back 100 years or so to allow climate research with a fairly high degree of confidence. (at least confidence in the validity of the data is what I mean, you can always argue about the validity of the conclusions drawn from the data ) A good example would be the Lincoln College data which goes back to 1881 and has been the subject of a phD thesis assessing its accuracy and applicability.

[Gary Roberts]

Yes.

I grant you not a huge number of stations, but there is enough data which has been carefully quality controlled going back 100 years or so to allow climate research with a fairly high degree of confidence. (at least confidence in the validity of the data is what I mean, you can always argue about the validity of the conclusions drawn from the data ) A good example would be the Lincoln College data which goes back to 1881 and has been the subject of a phD thesis assessing its accuracy and applicability.

Okay, a quick question:

My weather station's temperature sensor is mounted in an airport Stevenson Screen, which has been physically sited so's to be as 'standards compliant' as possible. The data from the sensor have been compared with readings from three high-quality glass thermometers within the same enclosure. Any deviation is so minute as to be almost unmeasurable. Yet the reported temperatures for the area (television, radio, newspapers, etc) are always wildly differing from not only my own station, but that of AgResearch's very nice AWS at Tara Hills. However it's always my data which is questioned. I just think that's a little strange.

[TonyT]

Well, I cant vouch for the sincerity of people Gary, just the authenticity of data I know about. I think some people like to think that the weather is all pretty much the same stuff, and what the heck. But you have obviously cottoned on to the extreme variability at a micro scale in an environment such as the McKenzie. For some people its very convenient to want to claim that their data is representative of a wide area.