Longest day of the year is here
Australia’s longest day of the year is upon us, with the summer solstice occurring across the Southern Hemisphere last night. Throughout each year, the tilt of our planet’s rotation axis changes relative to the sun. This simply means the north and south poles tilt...
Perth preparing for record-challenging Christmas heat
Perth is in store for a scorching Christmas Day as an extremely hot air mass heads towards southwestern Australia. Earlier this week, temperatures reached 47.9ºC at Mardie in WA’s Pilbara district. This was the highest temperature recorded in Australia and the Southern Hemisphere so...
Will Australia see another tropical cyclone in 2021?
There are early signs that tropical cyclone activity could pick up in the Australian region between Christmas and New Year’s Eve. We have already seen three tropical cyclones in the Australian region since the start of the cyclone season on November...
Antarctica posts 2nd smallest November sea ice extent on record
Amid our planet’s fourth warmest November in 142 years of records, Antarctica’s sea ice extent dipped to its second smallest November level in the satellite era. Despite the cooling effect of La Niña, the global surface temperature in...
Early look at Australia’s Christmas forecast
A hot air mass building over Australia this week will set the stage for a quintessentially hot and sweaty Christmas in some parts of the country. While large areas of Australia were kept unusually cool during November by...
Record-breaking run of positive SAM set to continue
New data has revealed that the Southern Hemisphere just saw a record-breaking run of positive Southern Annular Mode (SAM) values, and this run is set to continue until at least the end of the year. Here’s what that...
Could Australia hit 50C this week?
However, once the hot air spreads to low-lying regions in norhwestern Australia later this week, temperatures could approach 50ºC. The image below shows predicted surface air temperatures from the ECMWF-HRES model on Saturday and Sunday. Both days of...
Record $78bn year for agricultural production in Australia
Australia’s farmers are expected to post a record-breaking $78 billion agricultural production value in 2021-22, thanks in part to the first back-to-back La Nina events in a decade. Despite flooding rain delaying harvests and destroying some crops in...
