A key atmospheric indicator in the Pacific Ocean region has just surpassed the accepted threshold for El Niño, increasing the likelihood of abnormally dry and warm weather in Australia later this year. There has been a lot of talk recently about the potential for a strong El Niño in 2023. Most of this climate driver […]
Australia could see a lacklustre snow season this year if an anticipated unfavourable combination of Pacific and Indian Ocean climate drivers comes to fruition. The Australian snow season is notoriously fickle. Some years can see heaps of snow coming from multiple large snow-bearing systems (e.g. 1981, 1990, 2000), while other years barely have enough snow […]
The Southern Annular Mode (SAM) – one of the main broad-scale mechanisms influencing Australia’s climate – just reached one if its strongest positive levels on record. What is the SAM? The SAM refers to the north-south displacement of the powerful westerly wind belt that flows around Antarctica throughout the year. These westerly winds carry the […]
Despite the ocean giving clear signs that El Niño could form later this year, a lack of feedback from the atmosphere is giving forecasters a reason to be cautious in their outlook. An abrupt period of warming across the equatorial Pacific Ocean has seen an El Niño-like pattern of sea-surface-temperature anomalies emerging in recent months. […]
A rare meteorological phenomenon caused parts of southeastern Australia to shiver through their lowest May temperatures in years over the last 24 hours. The satellite images below show a low pressure system spinning over the Tasman Sea on Monday morning. Over the past 24 hours, this low and an associated cold front caused a wintry […]
Some of Australia’s main ski resorts and Aussie Alps have been given a preview of the season ahead after a wintry cold front delivered a decent bout of snow in the last 24 hours. A cold front swept over southeastern Australia on Wednesday causing a burst of showers and damaging winds in several states. The […]
Surges of tropical cloud and rainfall produced a relatively cool and wet April for large parts of Australia, although a few places in Queensland registered their warmest April on record. Australia’s area-averaged rainfall during April was 41.4 mm, which is 10.9 mm above the 1961-1990 average and the country’s wettest April since 2006. The map […]
Parts of central and eastern Australia experienced their coldest morning so far this year on Monday, with more wintry temperatures on the way later this week. The first morning of May was a fittingly cold start to the final month of autumn for large areas of NSW, Qld and the NT. The cold morning was […]
Widespread rain and thunderstorms will affect eastern Australia this weekend and early next week, with parts of eastern NSW expected to see more than 100 mm of rain by Monday. A series of cold fronts and low pressure troughs will cause showers over a broad area of southern and eastern Australia during the remainder of […]
Australia’s tropical cyclone season is officially underway, but we may not see much activity for few months yet. The season runs from November to April, and for mining operators and businesses across northern Australia, 2026-27 is shaping up to be a season where the headline numbers and the real risk may not line up. On […]
A positive Indian Ocean Dipole is underway, but this one is unlikely to deliver the textbook dry spring and summer that businesses have come to expect from the pattern. The Bureau of Meteorology officially declared a positive IOD on Tuesday, October 27, which typically like El Niño can cause drier and warmer conditions over parts of […]
Waters off Indonesia have cooled in recent weeks, an indication that a positive Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) event could be developing. It’s an important climate driver for Australia, and it could shape rainfall and temperatures heading into summer, with flow-on effects for farmers, energy and other industries. What is the Indian Ocean Dipole? The IOD […]
Leonora, WA, had its wettest September day on record earlier this month. Three weeks later, more than 1.3 million lightning pulses were detected within 800 km of the town in 48 hours. Why is a stalled trough delivering storms to mining country, and what it could mean for operations? The DTN Total Lightning Network detected […]
