It was all yellow: A warning was in place for the whole of Victoria.
Massive flooding forecast across “whole state”:
The Bureau of Meteorology has warned an “unprecedented” amount of rain is expected to fall in Victoria over a three-day period.
Asked to rate the storms out of 10, senior forecaster Mr Williams said: “I’ll take the punt and say it’s a 10 for Victoria.”
He said the most recent rain in a short period of time in Melbourne was 100-200 millimetres (in 2005 and 2011) and on both occasions: “it paralysed transport routes in the city.”
Get out your sandbags!
Events were cancelled, and the Premier of Victoria told people not to “have a big night on the town” in preparation.
The city was told to bunker down for an “absolutely massive” rainfall event over the weekend …
“Half the inhabitants of Melbourne have never ever seen anything like this,” the Bureau of Meteorology’s senior forecaster Scott Williams said on Thursday.
“It is an event that poses a threat to life.”
Not so much a flood of rain, but there was a flood of text messages:
About 7.4 million text messages were sent out to Victorians on Friday telling them to look out for flooding and stay safe.
The rain that fell (that’s millimeters, not inches):
Melbourne, Rainfall, Dec 3, 2017, Bureau of Meteorology. (51 mm = 2 inches)
There was potential for “more than 50mm per hour”, 300mm from Wangarratta to Hotham Heights, and Bendigo and Ballarat will likely see 150 – 200mm.
In 1934 during the same time of year 35 people died in a storm in Victoria.
Up to 3000 buildings across Victoria were damaged by the storm, with around 6000 people left homeless.
This was Kooyong Tennis Courts, deep inside Melbourne.
There were some places that recorded rain over 100mm in 24 hours (red dots).
Friday:
December 1st, 2017
Saturday:
Saturday, Dec 2nd (to 9am Dec 3)
Thoughts are with people in Euroa, where there is an actual flood, especially at the Caravan Park.
He said the storm was generally as expected and it was a “bonus” that the worst of it missed Melbourne.
“The way that it’s panned out has been similar to what we were predicting.
“It was certainly the kind of event worth preparing for,” Dr Tupper told reporters on Saturday.
“So if we had our time again, we would put out (warnings) with similar language to that.
Twitterati were not impressed:
So is Melbourne still standing or was it yet another beat up by the media? #melbournestorm
I hope #melbournestorm doesnt get any stronger. I just forged across this and almost drowned.
— Rupert Denton (@rupertdenton) December 1, 2017
Shocking scenes in Melbourne as desperate people line up for essential supplies #melbournestorm
— Darren Levin (@darren_levin) November 30, 2017
#melbournestorm WE WILL REBUILD!!!
— Wyngle Bells
Be EXTRA careful if you go shopping in
#Melbourne city today…
FOR SALE: Newly constructed ARK. In good condition, got it ready for the floods but no longer required. Animals not included. #MelbourneStorm
— Corey Ander (@_corey_ander) December 3, 2017
PS: There is heavy rain and snow in Tasmania. Welcome to another summer of global warming.
h/t Pat, Andrew V, David B, betheserf, and many more. :- )
Let’s not kid ourselves here certain elements in the public services deeply desire for natural disasters to cause more damage or loss of life to support their continual belief in a failed hypothesis.
521
The only natural disaster our way is that we’ve got our fire going in December. It’s that bleeding cold right now. I just wonder how the poor souls that live at higher altitudes are doing? Probably getting ready for the biggest snowfalls in recorded history.
Oh, and the models predicted this.
340
We lit the stove again this evening…perishing cold out there.
120
What a BoMmer
150
Its almost like the BOM has to hype everything up as it has the climate “tiger” by the tail and cant let go…. It was actually cringeworthy watching the emergency services top brass making it sound like a climate godzilla was attack victoria….
Godzilla just eating the premier would be a good start…..people would cheer I think….
I remeber floods back in the late 1970s in the riverina …..huge amounts of water, way way bigger than what we’ve just seen….
90
I’ve experienced far worse storms when I lived in Melbourne, one was around 20 years ago and another less than 10 years ago.
Werribee Mansion had/has a section where they show old photographs of the area and there’s one that shows the entire area underwater. It’s like a vast lake where there’s nothing visible except water as far as the camera could see. I suspect that photograph has been removed, as it’s from the 1800s, well before climate scientology began.
90
Bemused, we live at 3,500ft (1063m) in the Blue Mountains and it was 11.2C max today. Gas fire on in the lounge room and we would have had central heating on in the rest of the house if power had not been so damned expensive.
It’s raining too (no complaints about that, we need it) but this is going to be no “global warming” summer, I can feel it in my bones.
90
Bureau of Mediocrity
330
BOM has become a joke. They have bought the climate change scam and their fcasts now always exaggerate any event that has a precedent.
270
I lived In Wollongong in 1984
In Feb we had a rainfall event that a rain gauge at Wongawilli on the escarpment west of kembla grange recorded 982mm of rain in 24 hrs. It was and still is the highest recorded 24hr rainfall event in Australia. We now have a real precedent.
100
They didn’t buy the AGW scam. They were bought to build it. Hired!
That said, but for the hyperbole this was a good forecast as far as the rainfall forecast went. The big rain was forecast for a small area, only about a hundred km north of where it actually fell, which in my view is remarkably clever, even if only 75% or less of the predicted rain was recorded. The flooding suggests to me that this event was but a shadow of the 2010 event.
So the question becomes, who was responsible for the excessive alarm?
120
Those Twitter comments ridiculing the alarmists are a wonderful sign. A healthy sign.
People in Melbourne are at last waking up to the false news and false predictions of the alarmist BoM and the socialist scare-mongers that make up the socialist-green Victorian government.
The more the alarmists carry on like they have over a bit of rain the better. They are reinforcing in the mind of the people that they are complete fools who deserve no respect.
BoM continues to destroy any sliver credibility that remains.
Time to clean out the BoM.
520
Oh, and I just have to add that the “Yellow Map” carries the “C of A” mark. (Commonwealth of Australia).
The ability of the Commonwealth (aka BoM) to precisely predict that the rain will stop on the northern bank of the great Murray River and at the South Australian border is wonderful to observe, especially since only minor flooding is predicted for “the Murray River upstream of Lake Hume overnight Sunday into Monday”.
http://www.bom.gov.au/vic/warnings/flood/murrayupstreamofhume.shtml
Such precision is a joy to behold.
180
Sceptical Sam:
No, you miss the point. After the Victorian disaster alert (and the previous SA disaster alert which has gone strangely quiet) they can then have a NSW coming disaster alert, a Qld. coming disaster alert and possibly an alert for Lord Howe Island and Norfolk Island (although there would be nothing new for the latter 2 it might make them feel less neglected).
80
With the ammount of theatrics that accompnies “coming disasters” you could probably host a full West End production and have some hysteria left over.
Bit of a bargain, that…
40
They’re crying “Wolf!” poor things. Let them. The Emergency Services will soon get sick of it.
In the meantime, don’t poke them, don’t excoriate them. Laugh if you like but leave them alone because they are doing a far better job of destroying their own reputation than you can. They seem to have swallowed the CO2 meme totally, and the Extreme Weather meme too, and they aren’t paying attention to their statistical database at all well.
Document it and when you have a good pile, send it to the Minister.
I’m in Auckland. We’re still enjoying the anti-cyclone which was to bring a “six day heatwave” to Hobart at the start of last week. The weather here has been lovely, 21 – 23° C most days, touching 26° C today (max). Not a heat wave, but nicely warm. No wind (if you can call a cool SE breeze of 7km/h wind. Gentle zephyrs. Relative umidity is 85% so it’s starting to get sticky) and some cloud about 3/10ths. Nothing out of the ordinary for early December. Not at all.
Solar activity is low and it’s a calm sun (no sunspots). So our weather will remain low and calm. Watch the sun. (www.spaceweather-live.com). While there are no fizzy sunspots. terrestrial weather should remain more or less calm. If it starts to get bumpy, it hots up down here. Watch the weather pictures. Where are the thunder storms? Where are the clouds? What happened during this part of the previous solar cycle (circa 2008-9 ?).
Watch the satellite weather pics and pay attention to the cloud. If there are groups of thunderstorms out in the Pacific or up in the coral sea and there are flares (G, M class or better) a TC might form. An X-class flare (rare but possible if it’s a really hissy and spitty sunspot) will ramp the TC up to cat 5. Yeah, it’s not so likely because it’s a bit out of season yet.
Form your own ideas about what the weather will produce and record that. See what the BOM comes up with. And record it! All of it! Save the pages.
I’m watching and laughing, too. I’ve seen nothing out of the ordinary so far. But I’m isolated from it, you lot aren’t.
60
Sorry, I will amend that. That spot of snow in Tas over the weekend is out of the ordinary. But nothing over here on the other side of the pond is at all extreme. Not yet.
40
Since Toowoomba 2011 the BoM has a tendency to overstate flood risk. They got crucified for their lack of warning in that case. Some areas in Victoria actually have got near the forecast total. Most areas have got less.
The BoM weather models show that CO2 causes global warming so we know they are not to be relied on. However in this case some areas did get the forecast amount of rain.
After a week of nice warm to a bit muggy weather we are no back to global cooling with a vengeance. My car showed 13C on the Tullamarine freeway at 11am.
140
As I remember it, the Toowoomba event was totally without precedent, unimaginable up to that time. But the subsequent flood rains were predicted. They were not taken seriously because the weather forecasting science was not held in high regard prior to that time.
For those who don’t know it, Toowoomba sits right on top of the Great Dividing Range, with mountainous terrain only on the eastern side and below it, and the city on a tableland. It is hard to imagine how such a flood could have occurred so close to the top of the hill.
60
Note that rain which falls on the eastern watershed at Toowoomba has a journey of about 150km to the ocean, while that which falls on the western side has a journey of what, 3,000 km? A very different set of gradients.
40
RickWill:
Totally correct.
I asked a BOM officer in a Mackay meeting in 2012 why every time there was a bit of cloud on the horizon we got a severe weather warning. He told the meeting that as a result of the 2011 floods in Toowoomba and the Lockyer Valley, Premier Anna Bligh had vowed that there would never again be an avoidable weather related death on her watch, and had requested BOM (remember ALP was in power then) to upgrade their warnings.
Purely political.
140
Can’t even come close on tomorrow’s weather, but we’ll give you the temperature to expect on 5 July 2011.
70
It’s nearly 20 years since I saw a 24 hour forecast for pilots that turned out to be remarkably precise.
The computer generated 7 day forecasts issued today turn out at better than 50%.
00
Yes, it generally consisted of falling H2O, as they expected. Outstanding.
Even better, it missed Melbourne, just the way they said it wouldn’t. That is a bonus? Not relative to their prediction.
Similar, indeed: The drops fell downward. They were wet. They were transparent, unlike the Bom.
350
Yes. But is it filling the dams? We should ask Tim.
330
It filled our small one! What a bonus. The sort of downpour we had is not unseen around here and I’ve videos of similar ones in the past.
The Melbourne snowflakes believed the hype. We were expecting a visit which was cancelled because ‘It was unsafe’. How many others cancelled events unnecessarily and at what cost?
160
I know that the downpour was welcomed gratefully in East Gippsland where our family’s empty dam is now nearly full.
150
Not just Melbourne. Dozens of events were cancelled in South East Queensland today. The whole district was in danger of being washed out to sea according to predictions.
How much did we get? Not a single drop in the southern areas, & not much anywhere until way north.
190
My wife did say (I’m stuck in WA working while she is in inland SEQ) that it’s been reasonably wet and sunny. Indeed she said it’s been so wet and sunny that she can actually see the weeds growing. You see, what happens when you get sun, warmth, rain and CO2 is that things like to GROW A LOT. I’m still trying to figure out how that’s a bad thing, (Except for the afore mentioned weeds and the need to mow the grass twice as much). I expect the activists will crawl out of the woodwork to explain the error of my ways, and explain to me how I should be living like an 18th century peasant in order to “Save the Planet”. No thanks,I didn’t spend most of my life along with the other baby boomers building our technological society in order to spend my retirement subsistence farming.
221
It keeps us doing our bit to help keep the oil companies afloat, buying all that mower fuel
80
OPEC have decided to up the price of oil and relax all the supply restrictions.
The US shale drillers are already laying plans. Watch that space.
50
John of C,
Nothing will go into the dams because the earth is so parched – Tim said so – on numerous occasions.
130
I liked the line in the HS which said “experts warned the downpoor could match the rain produced by the cyclones that ravaged Nth Qld”. They forgot to mention their new scary line that they’ve been using this season “Storm Asthma”.
140
Actually, I did hear, I think it was on Friday, one mention/warning on the radio. I didn’t hear or see any catastrophic headlines about a repeat of the last episode though.
It can’t be fun for asthma sufferers at the best of times, but to have dramatic warnings blurted out must surely raise their anxiety and thus the possibility of an attack. I know the BOM needs to produce responsible warnings, but seriously, of late they’ve been crying wolf so many times it really unacceptable, especially for the amount of money we pay for them to operate.
141
Storm asthma is actually a real thing. The normal seeds and dust from pollen that people are subject to in spring can be worsened dramatically if they are pulverised by the energy inside a thunderstorm. This settles on the lungs and make it very difficult to breathe. I don’t suffer from asthma normally but I did have a violent reaction during a storm and needed medical treatment quickly. Couldn’t believe how hard it was to breathe, like being inside a silo.
110
Fair enough, but due to the stupidity of the VICemergencey app that replace a functional CFA app I got 8 asthma warnings on the day that was the focus. Really cant help people stay calm.
80
I get endless repeated messages from Vic Emergency…to the point that I feel like uninstalling it. I carefully put only our own immediate watch area in. The old Fire Ready app was much better.
80
Annie,
Is the Fire Ready app inflammable?
30
10
That silly thing on my keyboard didn’t work…sorry for blank. I was just pulling a face, so to speak.
21
What should a Breaking News agency do when nothing is breaking?
20
Look for some weather to break?
00
Some more evidence if any was needed that models, this time weather models, can not predict the future.
I wonder how ‘confident’ BOM is with the climate models they use?
120
Looks to me like the BOM and emergency services decided to use a normal rain event as a fundraiser as they need more of our money to keep us scared and in our place.
121
This one was being talked about as “unprecedented” before it even happened. Not sure what planet you have to be on to do that. They are certainly attention seeking.
100
At this time of the year the first drafts of the Commonwealth Government’s budget are being put together by the various Portfolios and Agencies.
The “New Policy Proposals” are being invented as we speak. The mid-night oil is being burnt.
They’re playing the “more money for us” game.
The rationale being: “If you don’t fund us you (the dopey Government Ministers) will be responsible for all the catastrophes that come our way via Gaia. (And we’ll make sure there’s as many as possible so that we can tell you: “We told you so”).
And, we’ll get our green useful idiot comrades in the media, in Get-Up and in the left-wing green academic slop-houses to rant and rave hysterically until you hear.
70
Maybe it was the 1891 flood which was referred to. Someone at the BoM got told to “bounce” the history, as usual, but he thought the bosses said “announce”. Bounce. Announce. You can see how that could happen.
By the way, here are some pics of Floodmaggedon, or, as they used to say in 1891, “the results of very heavy rain”: https://blogs.slv.vic.gov.au/such-was-life/the-great-flood-of-1891/
70
It’s no wonder people are sceptical of “climate change”, aka “man-made global warming”. These people couldn’t predict yesterday’s weather.
151
Today I did my usual walk along the Ivanhoe golf course track
beside the Yarra River. Waters three metres up the river banks
and the trunks of trees along the way. In two places lagoons
across the walking path, have seen that before but perhaps less
deep. Yarra trying again to imitate one of the great rivers,
(but not quite succeeding.) Needs more rain…
Glad the rain held off in Adelaide, go Marsh!
140
He has a Century at dinner. I think they will want at least 20 overs to knock over the openers tonight.
80
Something so Hammurabi* real about the Ashes.
Tho’ but a game, it’s based on Naychur’s
feedback loops, suffer the consequences
of what you do, brave Englanders ‘n Ossies,
(oy-oy-oy) risking leg before wicket or
bowlers’ failure to score wickets, there for
all to see…
Whereas… so oft, tenured bureaucrats in cloudy
towers (or conn-voluted corridors of power,)
yr ideological Paul Ehrlich’s, Stephen Schnieder’s,
Joseph Stiglitz’s et Al failed predictions are
re-conn-stituted, (swept under the carpet)’and
‘buy my new book,’ ‘How I predicted Fanny May’ or
post hoc propters ‘New York Under Water postponed
due to …’ ‘; Buy my book or watch the movie’ … … … …
* H/t Nassim Taleb ‘Antifragile’ re Hammurabi Rules.
Engineers made to sleep under bridges of their own
construction.
40
Beth, some Aussie told me years ago when I was an impressionable youth, that the Yarra flowed upside-down and that you could plough it.
Are you saying that he was having me on? 🙂
50
No you were told the truth but they’ve managed to fix it somewhat since then .
31
FD, Aussies are often like that,tongue in cheek.
Take the BOM weather pronouncements fer instance.
40
ABC found a “flood”:
2 Dec: ABC: Flood of tears as rainfall forces cancellation of wedding
By Stephanie Anderson and Yvette Gray
The table is set, the flowers and food are ready and so is the bride and groom-to-be, but an unlucky pair is forced to cancel their wedding because of the risk of flooding at their wedding venue in the Victorian town of Euroa.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-12-02/victorian-weather-forces-wedding-cancellation/9220154
plus more proof the weather was catastrophic:
2 Dec: ABC: Parma drama: Town left with parmigiana overload after rain puts brakes on bike ride
ABC Gippsland By Laura Poole and Robert French
While Victoria’s east prepares for the worst of the state’s flooding, there’s an oversupply of a different kind facing one central Gippsland community, which was preparing 600 parmigianas, 100 kilograms of steak and thousands of pies to feed 3,000 cyclists taking part in a now-cancelled bike ride.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-12-02/glengarry-parma-drama-post-great-victorian-bike-ride/9219952
50
Catastrophic – wedding cancelled.
30
We’re used to the weather bureau getting Melbourne’s weather wrong; thirty years ago we were told that it was particularly tricky because of Bass Strait and the Dividing Range. Overall, one forecast in three is adequate.
50
Cub reporter on the ABC said one night (getting peeved with having to do weather and studio staff slinging off at him) “its a prediction, not a promise”. Perhaps the BOM could maybe exercise a bit of humility also instead of ever stretching for their 15 minutes of fame and AGW reinforcement.
40
Serp,
This trickiness is an absolute fact.
You never know where Bass Strait might go from day to day and the Great Dividing Range runs around like a CNN reporter – hectic, to say the least.
30
ABC race commentator Alf Gard got into trouble in the 1970’s questioning the Weather Bureau’s predictions.
Alf was “a colourful character” (ex fighter pilot in WW2) and fond of a drop of whisky. Marooned at the old Cheltenham race day (due to torrential rain) in the callers box about 500 yards from shelter and making “heavy weather” (excuse pun) of calling the delayed, then on, then delayed, then finaly run, then a delayed third race as the jockeys went on strike because of danger, was placed on air “while the base announcer went off for a cup of tea and a chat. He (Alf) went on and on about the forecast for fine weather that day, pointing out that a piece of rope nailed to a short bit of wood would be more accurate, until cut off (by the sound engineer) on grounds of technical difficulty.
There was a certain amount of controversy until the Weather Bureau claimed that IF one examined their predictions, that they got the temperature right within ±2℉ for (?)38% of the time and were close for another 45% of the time (Total about 83%). Their main defence was that Alf Gard’s predictions on likely race winners weren’t as good.
Have they improved in the last 40 years – supercomputers not withstanding?
30
I used to live pretty much right on the Mentone (Cheltenham) Race course when I was a boy.
20
Graeme No. 3,
An Adelaide GP had considerable criticism of Alf for Alf’s tips not winning.
Alf’s response was “At least I don’t bury my mistakes”.
20
BOM reports escalating danger of shark infested water
in flooded zones, due to, well you know…
https://s3.amazonaws.com/jo.nova/graph/storms/aust/vic/sharks-shop.gif
40
Those are just Westfield execs on their lunch break.
110
🙂
30
Given hyperbole levels they were probably on the verge of a Sharknado! warning.
70
Nothing like a touch of ‘shark infested’ to get your forecast taken more seriously.
I’d have thought snakes to be a much greater danger than sharks swimming against the floodwaters. Custard might have been a different matter.
10
Today’s news showed 25 people at Bond treated for hypothermia. Sea temperature was 15c. No comment from BOM or ABC about sea temperature rise from man made global warming.
60
Yes, heatwave not, snowing in Tasmania in December.
60
It last snowed on Mt. Wellington in December in 2015, 2014, 2012. There was snow there in February 2017 and 2016. Also other months in summer which I have missed, so it isn’t unusual or UNPRECEDENTED.
30
Re that Tasmanian “heat wave warning” that Jo posted. I emailed an ex-Queenslander asking if he thought he’d survive. Response was “Thursday 38 degrees, Saturday 10”
20
But they were treated 5 metres further up the beach than usual due to sea level rise. Sorry , unprecedented sea level rise.
30
Five meters, Sorry you forgot the centi or milli prefix bit surely
40
Sea level has risen several nanometres in my time.
20
“Sea Level Rises Hundreds Of Feet Due To Sweat From Celebrities Waiting To Be Outed As Perverts”
http://babylonbee.com/news/sea-level-rises-hundreds-feet-due-sweat-celebrities-waiting-outed-perverts/
Via https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/12/01/friday-funny-bonus-edition-josh-on-manns-call-for-trench-warfare/#comment-2682464
20
What a beat up!
I saw the ABC had 3 reporters and camera crews (could have been more) out running around Victoria on Friday morning chasing rain storms and floods. Too bad they can not spend some of my money and send a crew out to see how the desalination plant is going. Remember that billion dollar monument to environmentalist hysteria. I guess it’s a case of don’t mention the war Aunty.
So the BoM can not get it right about an event that is happening right in front of it’s eyes yet we are to believe they can tell us about what will been happening in 100 years from now? Yeah right.
I just hope that some of the rain that did fall found its way to the parts of western NSW that haven’t had much rain in the last 6 years. That would be a lift for the xmas spirits in those parts.
191
Thanks DonS,
I got 48mms on Saturday afternoon. Much appreciated. Filled my two smallest dams and the ground is moist. I also got about the same over November, and the ground was basically dry till Saturday.
Interestingly, the Saturday rain was close to forecast.
Cheers,
Dave B
20
I would suggest that there is an aspect to all of these bureacratically, scientifically and media created over hyped disasters and catastophes, most of which never occur but all of which are dutifully reported by a breathless , deliberately emotion creating shallow to an extreme in intellect and ethics and morality media who add their own breathless, uneeded, unneccessary, ignorance based hype .
In the case of TV, such as carefully using the only tree that has fallen over in the district and the only water pool around [ with sharks and deadly flesh eating bacteria in it !! ] if one is to believe the reporter’s high pitched, rapid fire, emotionally worded ” its a disaster going on a catastropheeeee” reporting technique, all carefully framed and audioed to give the impression that the rest of the affected area is just as bad as the TV scene behind the sexy, heavily made up purported reporter’s left ear.
The aspect I refer to here is the rapidly growing and quite deliberate and emotion creating misuse of language, of specific words and phrases which through long useage over generations have a recognised and accepted level of meaning and a measured and long learned by public experience, emotional response in describing a situation.
What the bureaucracies, activists, [ God save this world from “activists” please ] funding chasers and scammers of every type are doing is bastardising the long accepted ability of certain words and phrases , particularly those that have been used for generations to describe serious and otherwise situations and to provide a long accepted level of emotional reaction and response , are now being used and abused so as to accelerate the hyperbole and exaggerate the long recognised and inherent level of meaning and create a highly exploitive emotional reaction relating to a situation and / or event.
And that increasing misuse and exaggeration of situations using language and verbiage for a deliberately created higher level of emotional response which is then further openly and quite cynically exploited for commercial, political, environmental and personal gain.
Again a use of emotion creating language and a phraseology that in the past has only been used in the direst situations so as to carry the real import of what is being described to the public, will and now is beginning to back fire rather severely on the organisations and the activists and groups who have used that long standard language and wording to describe situations and events that have previously been adaquately described by the use of far less inflammatory and far less emotionly involving reactions from the recipients of that cycnically hyped up information.
Some of this extreme hyping of rather ordinary basic information by a large number of increasingly cycnical creators of the hype are a least understandable.
The media to build circulation is one but they also wipe themselves out if they continue down that path of hype and exaageration for too long or through too much hype and their audience begins to get sick of constantly being addressesd with language and visions that rely almost totally on their emotional impact to generate an advantageous response to the message deliverer.
The ABC being a classic case here.
What is not understandable at all is the likes of the BOM , the ABC and in other rather numerous cases of recent years , the scientific / climate establishment hyping to extremes and using grossly exaggerating phraseology and verbiage to describe rather ordinary events or even non existent events such as the outlput of models as harbingers of Earth shattering developments .
The extremes of language used here in the end will only derive those bodies and scientific organisations and scientific disciplines and its personnel all of whom are involved in the deliberate and highly deceptive use of language and phraseology, of all credibility, respect and support for their beliefs and disciplines in the future
And that future we are already beginning to see the reactions against this constant hyping of rather average and passing weather and climate phenomena and the subsequent use of highly emotionally triggering language to try and force the citizenery into supporting acts for which that same citizenery will suffer severe and debilitating reductions in their personal circumstances and wealth and comforts and in their community lives and in the society in which they live and work and play.
181
Unprecedented has become a meaningless word. It used so much by alarmists that it can’t be taken seriously. Most of us have been around long enough to know that when it comes to weather events it has all happened before. And that’s just with the finite period of time that records have been kept in only a few locations on this planet.
121
I keep saying Bom give the warning that’s your job and I’m glad you’re leaving CAGW out of your last couple of “look out the sky is falling” events but please enough with, the everybody , the whole state, unprecedented, 10 out of 10, since records began .
I knew the second I heard the initial warning that BOM was in over hype mode , had they have been honest it would have been a possible high rainfall event over much of the state not record breaking unprecedented 300mm plus over the whole of Victoriastan crap they wailed out to the presstitutes who lapped greedily on the impending doom and magnified it .
I received a warning text for rain I’ve seen many many times , I know someone who received both fire and rain warnings and did nothing ( now that’s scary) they are breeding complacency with the sky is falling meme .
Go back to honest wording and I will forgive if you get it wrong or it ends up worse , you should have learned your lesson giving extreme heat warnings for Tasmania for a few days over 25c .
111
A million dollars of taxpayers money a day To run the BOM. All that dodgy remodelling of Australia’s past weather has got them confused.
Time for a clean out starting at the top.
90
And just heard the defence of Bom in the news saying that the forecasts were pretty much as what actually happened so they have learned nothing at all .
80
Comment 4.3.
20
As they say in the New World – OMG.
30
expect our MSM to move on to this:
Indian cricket captain Virat Kohli declared a short time ago at 536 for 7, because Sri Lankan fielders have been leaving the grounds, some feeling sick, and some have been wearing face masks, because of the haze/smog that affects the City at this time of year.
Kohli declared when play was being held up due to not enough Sri Lankan substitutes being available. it was as if he was saying we’ll bowl, no problem. then India got a wicket first ball of the Sri Lankan innings.
the tens of thousands of spectators are not wearing masks, and have been thrilled with the cricket so far.
3 Dec: TimesOfIndia: Smog affects Kotla Test, players spotted wearing masks
Highlights:
•A number of players were spotted wearing pollution masks during Day 2 of the second Test between India and Sri Lanka
•After almost half an hour of play post the lunch interval, play was halted for 10-12 minutes
•It has been learnt that the air quality in Delhi continues to linger in the ‘very poor’ category
Umpires Nigel Llong and Joel Wilson were involved in an animated conversation with (Sri Lankan captain) Chandimal. The team physio was seen in conversation with David Boon, the match referee, who eventually asked play to be continued. Gamage however, went off the field after the 125th over. Shortly afterward, Lakmal too went off…
The national capital since last week has witnessed a sharp drop in temperature in the wake of the winter season, but unfortunately, the city’s air pollution levels continue to rise. Delhi woke up to a cold-polluted Sunday morning with minimum temperature recorded at 8 degrees Celsius, a notch below the season’s average and a “very-poor” air-quality. According to the Central Pollution Control Authority (CPCB), the air-quality fell under “severe-plus or emergency” levels at Anand Vihar in west Delhi with PM2.5 reaching 433 in the morning – 17 times the safe limit, sector 125 Noida and Vasundhara in Ghaziabad…
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/sports/cricket/sri-lanka-in-india/smog-affects-kotla-test-players-spotted-wearing-masks/articleshow/61901401.cms
10
David Boon the match referee? what? ruling on how many tinnies at the lunch break?
50
CORRECTION: (TRIVIA) it was 16,000 at the match yesterday, not “tens of thousands”. thought I heard the commentators say 26,000.
smog/haze pretty bad again today, but it lifts after lunch.
10
3 Dec: Age: Melbourne weather: ‘A summer’s worth of rain fell in 24 hours’
by Timna Jacks; With AAP, Steve Lillebuen and Goya Dmytryshchak
“We think after that the main low will move away and we will just see showery, cool weather through most of the state for the remainder of Sunday,” Bureau of Meteorology senior forecaster Scott Williams said.
Most of the rain will have stopped by 9am but the forecaster warned there would still be flood risks with water yet to reach lower parts of rivers.
“This (floods) will continue to go on for quite sometime after the rain stops,” Mr Williams said…
A one-off payment of up to $540 per adult and $270 per child, capped at $1890 per household, is available to those forced to leave their homes because of the floods.
Applications for financial assistance can be made at the relief centres for up to seven days after the event, the state government said on its emergency website…
“The event is not quite over, and we always watch out for these events for what we sometimes call here at the weather bureau the ‘sting in the tail’ before the low finally moves away. We’ve still got quite a bit more rain from the north-east, there’s a lot of thunderstorm activity and heavy rain in NSW and some of that will still spill into the north-east.”…
There was no flooding during the day in Melbourne, despite the serious warnings prompting officials to cancel major events, businesses to prepare for major flooding, and even workers to leave the city early on Friday upon the urging of the state’s premier…
PHOTO CAPTION: Euroa Caravan Park flooded after storms on Saturday. Photo: Liam Mannix
http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/melbourne-will-be-a-very-wet-place-on-saturday-night-warns-bureau-of-meteorology-20171202-gzxey2.html
media must have been falling over each other at the caravan park:
FROM JO’S ABC LINK: PHOTO CAPTION: Photo: A caravan park at Euroa was evacuated during the flood emergency. (ABC News: Stephanie Anderson)
Canberra Times carried Age writer Turbet’s stuff yesterday, tho there’s much more posted later on her Age page:
2 Dec: Canberra Times: Melbourne Weather: Saturday, December 2, 2017
by Hanna Mills Turbet
Heavy rain has hit Melbourne with reports of flooding around the city. North-east Victoria has also been hit hard. Share your tips, pictures and videos via email.
As it happened: our live blog of yesterday’s rainfall
A quick correction from me.
A Twitter reader John has pointed out that we misreported a Wye River landslide in Wye River in the below graphic yesterday.
GRAPHIC
He is right. The landslide was on the VicRoads website as it is still causing traffic problems along the Great Ocean Road however, it in fact happened in September and we misunderstood. Thanks, John…
Victoria’s weather “similar to what we were predicting”: BOM
VIDEO: 19mins42secs: Watch the press conference here
Here’s the list of everything that has been cancelled this weekend because of the rain.
– The final leg of the Great Vic Bike Ride, Saturday and Sunday.
– Taste of Melbourne, Friday through Sunday
– Mazda Opera in the Bowl, Saturday
– Art Centre outdoor market, Saturday and Sunday
– Polo in the City, Saturday
– Santa’s House at Federation Square, Friday through Sunday
– Carols by the Bay Geelong, Saturday
– Brewers Feast: Melbourne Beer Festival, Saturday to Sunday
– Warrandyte Saturday Market
– MeepleCon17 (gaming event), Friday to Sunday
– Knox Carols by Candlelight, Saturday
– The Disability Sport and Recreation Festival, Saturday and Sunday
– Hume Carols by Candelight in Craigieburn (now on next Saturday)
– 2017 Cycle Tour of Bright
– The Eltham Craft and Produce Market has been cancelled for Sunday.
If I’ve neglected to include something, please let me know….
http://www.canberratimes.com.au/victoria/melbourne-weather-saturday-december-2-2017-20171201-gzxaim.html?sortOrder=LATEST&p=5
20
Also Canceled
Eppalock Gold Cup at Lake Eppalock
VIC Water Ski Titles
30
Have to laugh about the ski titles, were they worried that the lake might fill with water or that the skiers might get wet
90
Apparently having to travel to an extreme sport was considered to extreme. So it seems the nanny’s are now in full control.
50
guess this reporting is from the press conference. watching cricket so not sure. rain has stopped The Ashes; Michael Clarke said he can’t remember Adelaide being so cold at this time of year:
2 Dec: Age: Melbourne weather: Bureau defends dire weather warnings
by Steve Lillebuen
But there was no flooding overnight in the metro region, despite the serious warnings prompting officials to cancel major events, businesses to prepare for major flooding, and even workers to leave the city early on Friday upon the urging of the state’s premier.
State weather bureau manager Dr Andrew Tupper said they would do it again if faced with a similar weather pattern…
Coming up with an accurate weather prediction up to four days in advance of a storm was always difficult, he said, and not unlike forecasting the location and speed of a tropical cyclone, where forecasts can often change…
“I guess the good news is, from the Melbourne perspective in particular and those in western Victoria, the event hasn’t affected that area as much…
“But, despite all the disruption of preparation – we know that events have been cancelled and people have put in a lot of work – it was certainly the kind of event worth preparing for.
“So, if we had our time again, yes, we would put out an event with similar language to that.”…
On Thursday, Bureau of Meteorology forecaster Scott Williams warned: “It is an event that poses a threat to life, there will be a massive amount of lightning, there will be roads cut, flood waters.”
“Half the inhabitants of Melbourne have probably never seen something like this,” Mr Williams said.
“This is a vast, intense, high impact event for this state.”…
Emergency Management Commissioner Craig Lapsley said Melbourne dodged the worst of the storm with no reports of flooding in the metro area. But it was still appropriate to issue warnings for the entire state, he said.
“We’ve done, with the forecast that was put to us, the best we can to warn the whole of the Victorian community, because there was rain across Victoria, and I think we’ve done that,” he said…
http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/melbourne-weather-bureau-defends-dire-weather-warnings-20171202-gzxcf3.html
30
Wait ! What they cancelled a beer festival ?!? That’s it they’ve gone to far sack the lot of them .
90
Well, they never did like people running the risk of getting wet on the inside. 🙂
40
Big omission – Taggerty Community Christmas Party and the Taggerty Caravan Park
50
You beat me to it! Not that we were going to it as the ‘Taggerty has Talent’ part is rather off-putting! There is the Christmas party at Buxton next weekend if you are feeling deprived Yarpos. 😉
30
Actually, the weather at the time scheduled for the party was atrocious, very wet and windy so cancelling the event was a justified call. Of course, they could have moved it into the village hall, could they not?
20
What about the predicted floods? Someone might have drowned. Inside.
20
It’s near to Little River but well above it so one hopes there’ll be no submersion, in or out.
10
2 Dec: ScottishSun: WINTER WASHOUT: Scotland to be plunged into -10C Big Freeze AGAIN as 55mph gales and snow batter UK
By Neal Baker and Paul Sims
The mercury will again plummet to below freezing with a mix of widespread frosts and wintry showers set to take a stranglehold by Thursday…
It could be even colder than this week when temperatures fell to as low as -6C with the wind chill factor making it bite even more…
Met Office forecaster Charles Powell said: “Wednesday is going to be the day everything changes. It’s going to be windy, with everywhere seeing a dose of pretty persistent rainfall.
“That will open the floodgates for what looks to be seriously cold air – probably colder than what we saw this week – bringing gales and snow showers.
“We are almost back to square one.”
A Met Office yellow weather warning was in place this morning for ice across much of the country…
The weather phenomenon La Nina could bring a white Christmas and plunging temperatures to the UK…
https://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/news/1920242/scotland-weather-temperature-forecast-snow-cold/
3 Dec: UK Express: UK weather: Country set to FREEZE next week in grip of BLIZZARDS
THE polar plunge is set to return next weekend with blizzards.
By Jon Coates
The Met Office said a second bout of gales at the weekend could then bring snow at low levels in the North and on higher ground further south.
Forecaster Mark Wilson said: “Two depressions are due in the coming week.
“The first sees Wednesday and Thursday windy for all areas, with the strongest winds in the south and gale-force gusts up to 55mph.”…
Former BBC weatherman Michael Fish, now forecasting for Netweather, confirmed: “Arctic air is set to return later in the week, tangled up with low pressure, which may mean even blizzard conditions.”
Bookies Ladbrokes has cut the odds on a white Christmas to 6/4 for Glasgow, 4/1 for Manchester and 5/1 for London.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/weather/887360/uk-weather-latest-bbc-weather-snow-freezing-polar-temperature-met-office
20
Oh Lord! And the scots has stuffed their electricity system. I hope not too many die.
40
I’m guessing all those wind turbines won’t function very well in gale force winds and blizzards.
Maybe it will be enough to give them a wake up call….
but as you say “I hope
not too manynobody dies.”71
Andy:
If the power goes out in winter in Scotland there will be many deaths. All those wind turbines are useless in gales as they shut down. Equally useless in really cold weather when there is no wind and ice on the blades.
Eighteen months ago there was debate among the non-believers in AGW about who would blackout first, Scotland, Germany or South Australia. We all know who “won” but it looks like both Germany and Scotland are sprinting for that line as hard as they can.
140
The Left lust after natural disasters as it suits their depopulation agenda, as long as those being killed are civilised Western people.
Of course, the Elites will be protected from natural disasters at taxpayer expense.
141
It gets worse! The bureau has even made aviation weather reports vague. An ARFOR used to give a plain text description of significant weather for a specific area…right down to the time of crossing of front/trough above specific landmarks. WX to be expected with accurate geographic divisions…Now, I get a grainy diagram that resembles the edges of a Milk Arrowroot biscuit to depict cloud coverage over something the size of a state. no position, no direction and no idea!
110
Wonderful! They are making themselves irrelevant. It would be good if they got real jobs and actually earned what they are paid.
They appear to believe the simulations that can’t even get this afternoon’s weather right. The really sad about it is that when the real 500 year event occurs, they will likely get it wrong by extreme under forecasting.
Meteorology: the only profession where you can be consistently wrong and still keep your job. All you have to do is come up with some kind of excuse why you got the forecast wrong.
Not all are that bad. AccuWeather.com seems to produce useful forecasts, for where I live, most of the time. At least they don’t pretend it is going to be a Noah class flood when all that happens is that things get a bit wetter than usual.
100
That’s the comment that needs to go to the Government.
Privatize the BoM. Get rid of the dead wood. They’re dicks.
The perfect “performance pay” system.
80
Just got a message from friends in Albany they have been having a fire at night for a while now it’s been so unusually cold .
81
Global cooling has begun, tell me I’m dreamin’?
50
You’re dreaming Elgordo just because everyone in your region is shivering doesn’t mean a thing .
It’s been the hottest Evah and unprecedented.
30
deluges everywhere?
3 Dec: ABC: Darwin storms: Bureau of Meteorology rain gauge breaks during downpour
ABC Radio Darwin By Neda Vanovac
Darwin’s rain gauge broke during record rainfall on Saturday night as multiple storm fronts collided over the Top End.
The remote community of Gunbalanya near Kakadu recorded once-in-50-year rainfall levels, with 101mm falling in just over an hour on Saturday night.
“It was a deluge,” NT Bureau of Meteorology forecaster Gabriel Branescu said.
At Gunn Point, just north of Darwin, 110mm of rain fell in just over an hour, also exceeding the once-in-50-year threshold.
“[In] Darwin itself, the rain gauge broke around midnight when it recorded 84mm — the total was 85.2mm at Darwin Airport, so that was a deluge, too,” Mr Branescu said…
The storms formed further inland over the Arnhem region and travelled about 150km west to Darwin.
“They managed to come through in a really good environment — really unstable, really moist over Darwin — so they really managed to light up… What a show,” Mr Branescu said.
Sweltering build-up temperatures have now dropped, and at lunchtime on Sunday it was sitting at about 25.5 degrees Celsius in Darwin.
“It’s happened only five times in history with temperatures below 26 degrees in December in Darwin,” Mr Branescu said.
He said after such a big storm the weather would calm down a bit in time for Carols by Candlelight on Sunday evening.
“Heading towards the afternoon and evening the probability of showers and storms will drop considerably, so probably towards the evening [it] will be 20 per cent [chance] or so, so don’t worry about that,” he said.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-12-03/darwin-storms-bureau-meteorology-rain-gauge-breaks-in-downpour/9221414
above made me think our BoM man was a creative type.
I think he is the one with the guitar in the following – you must listen to this song!
2 Nov: ABC: Open Mic with Senior BOM Forecaster Gabriel Branescu
On Mornings with Adam Steer
He brings you the weather everyday, but did you know BOM Senior Forecaster Gabriel Branescu was in a band in Antarctica called The Meltdowns?
ABC Radio Darwin’s Mornings program was at the Bureau of Meteorology when Gabriel treated us to a song.
http://www.abc.net.au/radio/darwin/programs/mornings/gabriel-branescu/9112970
PIC: abcdarwin Adam Steer sits with BOM weather forecaster Gabriel Branescu live from the Bureau of Meteorology NT
https://www.instagram.com/p/Ba-SHxKBKOn/?taken-by=abcdarwin
10
comment in moderation re: 3 Dec: ABC: Darwin storms: Bureau of Meteorology rain gauge breaks during downpour
40
Your taxes at work.
It’s a joke. Sack the lot of them.
50
Those Twitterati posts are genuinely lolworthy 🙂 Great effort from all – the very finest brutal Ozzie humour. Cheers from Pom land.
80
How many hundreds of billions of millions of times do Bom have to tell you they don’t exaggerate!
40
Increased flooding risk is essentially world wide. Water vapor continues to increase at 1.5% per decade and has been since 1960. Click my name to see graph and NASA/RSS data source.
40
Melbourne: Not the end of the world … but, you can see it from there.
30
I totally agree Jo, last week when the ABC fake news broadcasts were taking place one could sense the alarmism being projected towards the listeners. The dangers were being deliberately repeated and exaggerated. Sure heavy rain causes flooding and other problems, but the message was all over the top. Life threatening rainfall was about to engulf half of Australia. What happened was not really a great drama. We have coped with heavy rain in the past and we will have to do so in the future. This was just another brainwashing exercise on the public, silly and gullible enough to believe.
GeoffW
131
so they say:
4 Dec: Courier Mail: Queensland weather: Severe thunderstorms forecast for much of southeast Queensland coast
by Madura McCormack
THE Bureau of Meteorology has warned residents along much of the state’s coastline to expect severe thunderstorms bringing possible flash flooding today.
In a warning released at 10am today, the Bureau said heavy rainfall, damaging winds and hail were all possible along a stretch of coastline from the Sunshine Coast to the Whitsundays.
Forecasters expected the deluge to begin early yesterday but the system hovered over central Queensland before finally arriving in the southeast late last night. In Rockhampton, heavy rain caused flash flooding, shutting off a number of streets.
In about an hour, 60.4mm fell in Yaamba northwest of Rockhampton.
Gympie was pelted with hail measuring more than 2cm and about 40mm of rain fell in the area between 3pm and 6pm. A total of 21 southeast Queensland beaches were also closed because of the weather threat…
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/weather/queensland-weather-severe-thunderstorms-forecast-for-much-of-southeast-queensland-coast/news-story/48662b8ca9b38651a6619ba5546efcd6
4 Dec: Bundaberg Mail: Carolyn Booth: Rainfalls up to 180mm possible: BOM
PREDICTED heavy rain has begun to fall across the region, with the Bureau of Meteorology issuing a flood watch for coastal catchments between Sarina and Brisbane this morning, including the Burnett River.
BOM says minor flooding is possible across the flood watch area today and tomorrow, and people living or working along rivers and creeks should monitor latest weather forecasts and warnings.
Catchments are becoming increasingly wet following rainfall over the past week.
BOM is warning that 24-hour rainfall totals of 20-80mm are possible about coastal catchments south of Sarina today, with the highest totals currently expected north of Caboolture.
Isolated heavier falls in the range of 80-180 mm are possible with severe thunderstorms. BOM said severe thunderstorm warnings would be issued during the event as required…READ ON
https://www.news-mail.com.au/news/rainfalls-up-to-180mm-possible-bom/3281700/
20
2 Dec: ABC: Canberra weather: Emergency services to work throughout the night in response to heavy rain
By Clare Sibthorpe and Jake Evans
By 4:30pm Canberra Airport had recorded 55 millimetres of rain since Friday morning, with 17 millimetres falling since 9am Saturday…
***”Most damage has been to solar panels in homes and tiling on roofs,” she said…
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-12-02/canberra-to-prepare-for-months-worth-of-rain/9219396
***can’t find anything else online so far about damaged solar panels.
20
you don’t say!
4 Dec: Australian: Pia Akerman: Bureau of Meteorology to learn from Victoria’s not-so-big wet
Victoria’s emergency chief says there are “learnings” to be gained amid criticisms the Bureau of Meteorology overegged its warnings about the “10/10” weekend rainstorm.
Dramatic warnings about the expected rainfall saw 7.4 million text message alerts sent out across the state on Friday night, events cancelled and restaurants closed as people were told to stay off the roads.
Melbourne recorded less than half of the forecast 150mm of rain between Friday and Sunday, though elevated areas in the city’s southeast recorded higher totals and flooding caused damage to homes in Eurora, two hours northeast of Melbourne.
Emergency Commissioner Craig Lapsley today defended last week’s warnings, though he suggested a senior bureau forecaster’s claim it would be a “10/10” weather event went too far.
“I’m not saying the bureau has got it wrong, but ‘10/10’ … was overused,” Mr Lapsley said.
“I think that set a bar that was right up there.
“I don’t think I could say it was a 10 out of 10 storm … I’ve had a good chat with the bureau, I think there’s some learnings out of this to get the narrative or the story right because that’s important.”
BOM senior forecaster Scott Williams was the key driver of the pre-rain safety message, warning on Thursday that the rain posed a risk to life and could cause “massive flooding” around Melbourne…
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/bureau-of-meteorology-to-learn-from-victorias-notsobig-wet/news-story/8b9ac960b3070e82214dde9336a16c0d
20
With the massive damage and communications probably down, this comment probably won’t get there until long after the floods recede. But just wanted to cheer you on through these harrowing times. Australia always shines in swimming at the Olympics so no doubt that you’ll survive!
40
4 Dec: The Age: Melbourne weather: Storm shouldn’t have been called a ’10/10′ says Craig Lapsley
by Chloe Booker
Mr Lapsley told 3AW the Bureau of Meteorology needed to reassess its messaging processes for future weather events.
“I think we’ve got some work to do [with the bureau] with some of the products,” he said. “We are caught a little bit.”
He suggested “spot weather warnings” with more up-to-date information on localised and changing weather conditions.
Senior forecaster Scott Williams warned Victorians on Thursday “half the inhabitants of Melbourne have never ever seen anything like this”…
“If you wake up [on Friday] and think it isn’t going to happen you’ll just have to wait a while. They didn’t think the Titanic would sink either but it did,” he said…
He went on: “It is an event that poses a threat to life, there will be a massive amount of lightning, there will be roads cut, flood waters.
“I think this event will turn farms into lakes.” …
http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/melbourne-weather-storm-shouldnt-have-been-called-a-1010-says-craig-lapsley-20171203-gzxynr.html
both pieces behind paywall:
Melbourne storm: BOM didn’t get it wrong
Herald Sun · 1 day
Cut the snarkiness and leave BOM alone
Herald Sun – 2 days ago
20
***unexpected/unpredicted. snowfall video – if you can get the video to play – 15 sec ad precedes a mere 15 secs of snow.
47 secs of Victoria “floods’ – video showing caravan park flooding, probably Euroa – can’t get the video to play.
however, some good pics of the snow from the public:
VIDEOS/PICS: 4 Dec: 9News: Tasmanian towns blanketed by ***unexpected summer snowfall
It might be the start of summer in Australia, but some areas of Tasmania woke up to a fresh blanket of snow outside their front doors yesterday.
The owners of Great Lake Hotel in Miena have shared photos on social media this morning of the fresh powder which fell overnight.
“Nice surprise- just stuck my nose out to see why the power flickered. SNOW now back to bed for me,” one of the posts read…
One picture showed a car covered in snow with the date, “03/12/17”, drawn across the bonnet…
Snow is not totally unheard of in Tasmania at this time of year, Weather (Weatherzone) senior meteorologist Brett Dutschke told 9news.com.au.
“Almost every December there will be some snow falling in Tasmania,” Mr Dutschke said.
“That wouldn’t be that uncommon at this time of year.”.
Mr Dutschke did say, however, that the amount of snow that appeared to have fallen is “unusual”.
“I’ve seen some images of some pretty decent snowfalls yesterday,” he said.
“I think that amount of snow would be reasonably unusual for this time of year.”…
“It got down to about freezing anywhere above 1000m, having snowfalls yesterday in those areas was quite likely.”…
https://www.9news.com.au/national/2017/12/04/09/30/tasmanian-towns-blanketed-by-unexpected-summer-snowfall
10
Unexpected snow in tassie ? Early last week we had a cloud formation that sweeps up from the Antarctic over southern west Australia and every time I see that we usually get a cold snap and snow . I’m not into the whole what cloud is this and what does it mean but those speckled clouds usually mean cold weather and rain .
30
“sprinkling” of snow? even their own pics disprove that one.
“extreme weather”? really?
“Sydney sweltered” provides an excuse (as if DM needed one) for about 10 sexy beach pics:
4 Dec: Daily Mail: Sydney swelters, Melbourne’s underwater and it’s SNOWING in Tasmania: Summer serves up crazy weekend of weather – and more is on the way!
Australia’s summer kicked off with a wide range of weather, including a ***sprinkling of snow in Tasmania
Cold conditions east of Launceston saw resorts blanketted in white, with rain expected later in the week
Meanwhile Sydneysiders flocked to the beach as temperatures reached 29C only a day after floods in Victoria
***Extreme weather broke century-long records with two days of torrential rain hitting areas around Melbourne
By Kirby Spencer and Peter Devlin and Nkayla Afshariyan
While Sydney sweltered through temperatures nearing 30C on Sunday, flood warnings remained for parts of Victoria and snow was even recorded in central Tasmania…
***Meanwhile, Sydneysiders flocked to the beach as temperatures soared to 29C, only a day after record-breaking floods devastated Victorian towns…
Temperatures were expected to peak in the low 20s in Sydney as the week got underway, before hitting a warm 29C on Thursday…
Several vehicles were caught in the (Victorian) downpour, including a BMW 4WD and a black Maserati…
FINAL PHOTO CAPTION: Lanes and alleys in some Melbourne suburbs resembled streams as they filled with rainwater
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5140669/Crazy-weather-sees-Sydney-swelter-snow-Tasmania.html
10
Cold in Tassie and hot in Sydney this surely is a sign of AGW .
21
Poor Melbourne, how will they survive being hit by weather the rest of us have gone through so many times? They may have to learn to sink or swim. But I’ll bet they already know how to swim. The trouble is, from those horrible photos it doesn’t look like anyone will need to swim.
Are you guys down under sure it’s not your BoM and your press that are under water? Better check, they may need help more than poor old Melbourne does. Id send them buckets to bail out the water and canoes for the really bad places.
40
I hope you all realize that I know it could be bad for some in Melbourne and I hope it works out to be the bare minimum wherever there is any storm damage.
40
On such issues BoM and others in this space can’t win. Today sees a class action start for Queenslanders, for whom extreme storm rains a few years ago, caused catastrophic damage. BoM gave a dire forecast. The suggestion is that those who might have been able to moderate the flood flows failed to do so despite the forecast. So much for the impact of the dire forecast. Also,indications are that insurers sought to take cover behind “definitions of flood events”. In any case Flannery has vetoed such events. How dare BoM forecast otherwise!
50
Here’s a case where the dam operators had no confidence in a bom prediction with disastrous consequences.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-12-04/2011-flood-class-action-begins-against-government-dam-operators/9223624
20
robert rosicka –
ABC obviously happy to headline and begin their piece with mentions of BoM’s forecasts.
whilst the following doesn’t relate to the four and eight day forecasts, it’s worth remembering:
18 Jan: Courier Mail: Weather watchers tipped Lockyer danger
by Alison Sandy and Rodney Chester
The Bureau of Meteorology said it did issue severe weather warnings for heavy rainfall leading to localised flash flooding for people in the Southeast Coast, Eastern Darling Downs and Granite Belt the night before and again at 5am and 11am on the Monday.
But it wasn’t until 4.16pm, after the disaster, that it warned of “moderate to major flooding” in Lockyer Creek and surrounding waterways. At 5pm, the bureau made a “top priority flash flood warning” for Helidon – but still no mention of Grantham – with very fast and dangerous rises possible downstream at Gatton over the next few hours.
Queensland Bureau of Meteorology director Jim Davidson said the bureau needed time to check the details of what was known and when.
“Even now, with so many people tied up in operations, it’s not that easy to cross-check times,” he said. “We’re … gathering information ourselves (and) everything will be available in due course.”…
Weatherwatch meteorologist Anthony Cornelius was one of the first to alert the online weather community with fears for Grantham and rang his family living in the Lockyer Valley, telling them to stay home, out of the line of fire. He said the bureau should have known “or at least have an idea of what the effects would be”.
“The Grantham area had already suffered several flash flood events during the past few days, and they were from rainfalls and even radar echoes that were much, much smaller than what was showing on the Monday,” Mr Cornelius said. “Helidon, upstream of Grantham, recorded an 8m spike in creek level in a short period – that’s an incredible rate of rise.
“Approximately an hour after that, the bureau issued a warning for the Lockyer Creek but they mostly discussed the lower catchment. They indicated moderate to major flooding but made no mention of the very large spike coming down from Helidon that would go on to Grantham and Gatton.”
Mr Cornelius said once those huge spikes occurred in Helidon, “there should have been some fairly big alarm bells going off at the bureau”.
“I just hope the public don’t think: ‘It was such an extreme event, it could have been easy to miss’ when it wasn’t. There were very strong indications that something big was going to occur.”…
Mr Cornelius said the bureau was the only body allowed to issue weather warnings.
The weather watchers, using the BOM site, last night indicated they would present their analysis of the flash flood to the royal commission, which will look at the adequacy of warnings.
Their concerns mirror the findings of the state-sponsored report into Brisbane’s 1974 floods which was also critical of the adequacy of warnings…
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/weather-watchers-tipped-lockyer-danger/news-story/5cb751d3e3af2351b6187b75b5ca96e1
10
Pat the Murray river downstream of Hume Weir dropped about a metre on the weekend leaving a few angry fisherman who were out and about for Cod opening .
Now why would they have done that do you think .
21
Sorry why would they have closed the release gates to reduce the flow by that much given the warning that existed by the bureau some could argue flood mitigation some could argue greed some could argue they knew the rain was not going to be unprecedented.
31
The latter.
They know from experience.
The BoM is just feeding the carping trolls. Mud chewers that live under a bridge. All of them.
10
Shivering in Sydney today. Just turned the heater. MUST be global warming!
20
BoM’s away, again…two reports mentioned…read all:
4 Dec: SMH: Peter Hannam: Unusual hot spell for Victoria and Tasmania driven by warm seas, stable systems
The Bureau of Meteorology, though, has tallied the many records for Victoria and Tasmania during the blistering end to spring in a special report it released on Monday.
Despite a cool start to last month – which has returned for the start of December – southern Victoria had its second-warmest November on record, behind only 2009.
In Melbourne, the 12 November days with temperatures topping 30 degrees eclipsed the previous record of 10, set in 2009.
Overnight temperatures were consistently mild, with Melbourne clocking up 14 consecutive nights above 15 degrees – easily beating the previous record stretch of nine nights in a row, also set in 2009.
The city had previously not recorded such a warm spell before January…
The warmth also meant Victoria set November records for state-averaged mean temperatures – taking into account minimums and maximums.
The final 12 days of the month averaged above 20 degrees, eclipsing 10-day runs in 1959 and 2009.
Similarly, the state’s 21 days in a row of minimums above 10 degrees easily beat the previous 16-day stretches in 2000 and 2009.
The state’s average mean temperature was more than 3 degrees above the 1961-90 average. It was only the sixth time Victoria has notched up so large an anomaly for any month, the bureau said…
In Tasmania – which has seen snow overnight – the November records were even more off the charts.
Average maximum temperatures for the state came in 3.79 degrees above the long-run norm.
That beat the previous record anomaly of 2.09 degrees set in 1914 by a whopping 1.7 degrees, and was the largest departure from the average maximum for any month.
Hobart’s six consecutive days of 25 degrees or warmer weather equalled the record for any time of the year. Previous such stints had all occurred between January and March.
“In some cases, particularly in southern and western Tasmania, the length of the warm spell was unprecedented for any time of year,” the bureau said. “Many records were set for consecutive days with maximum or minimum temperatures above thresholds.”…
The bureau’s report noted how the blocking high pressure also contributed to milder conditions further up the east coast of Australia.
Sydney, for instance, barely notched an above-average month for maximum temperatures. Virtually all of the coast further north to Cape York in Queensland had a below-average November for daytime temperatures…
For Australia as a whole, temperatures last month were above average for minimum, mean and maximums, but less unusually so than the previous two months.
For spring as a whole, all but South Australia and the Northern Territory recorded a spring in the top 10 warmest, in national data going back to 1910, the bureau said ***in a separate report…
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/weather/unusual-hot-spell-for-victoria-and-tasmania-driven-by-warm-seas-stable-systems-20171203-gzxzwf.html
10
South west WA have been enduring a cold spell but why would the bureau of making stuff up include that .
When people in Albany say it’s unusual to be lighting a fire every night to keep warm and Bom prattle on about warming you have to wonder .
31
Again, this rain makes the roads very muddy.
It is an inconvenience when you have to drive into town to collect the drought relief cheque.
60
some rather unusual movement for flood waters?
4 Dec: SunshineCoastDaily: RELENTLESS: Floodwaters close cafes, ***cascade down apartments
by Scott Sawyer and Francesca Mcmackin
UPDATE 2.30PM: More than 30mm dropped in the last hour in suburbs across the Coast, as floodwaters have closed cafes and sent torrents of water cascading down unit block stairwells.
Parts of Caloundra copped more than 30mm between 1pm and 2pm today, while heavy rain continued to pound Mountain Creek…
Meanwhile unit blocks in Alexandra Headland have had their garages turned into wading pools and floodwaters have created waterfalls as they ***cascade down stairwells…
PLUS POSTS FOR EARLIER RAINFALL
https://www.sunshinecoastdaily.com.au/news/widespread-deluge-flood-severe-storm-warnings-coas/3281773/
10
BOM’s seasonal outlook for December to February is not only contradictory it’s doesn’t really match what’s happening on the ground so far .
11
I think Robert that they have just shaded in green, Victoria. Adjusted after the event. Amazing.
10
4 Dec: Yahoo: Emergency boss tempers Vic rain warning
Benita Kolovos and Caroline Schelle AAP
Victoria’s bureau manager Dr Andrew Tupper defended the warnings and said they were necessary, but wouldn’t comment on the criticisms.
“Absolutely it was worth putting out the severe weather warnings,” Dr Tupper told AAP.
He would not respond to Mr Lapsley’s comments but did say he understood some people were concerned the warnings were given too early.
“We can’t really wait until we know what exact suburbs or areas are going to be hit,” Dr Tupper said.
“A warning is put over a general area and then it is narrowed down as we get a more accurate picture.”
Emergency Services Minister James Merlino defended emergency warnings, saying the bureau correctly predicted the amount of rain.
***”What is hard to predict is the timing of the rain, the intensity when it falls and the location.”…
https://au.news.yahoo.com/vic/a/38132393/worst-of-flooding-rains-over-for-victoria/
***lol.
20
4 Dec: Herald Sun: Susie O’Brien: Why we won’t believe Bureau of Meteorology’s extreme weather forecasts
THEY promised Stormageddon. They said it was a “10” storm and “uncharted territory”.
Half of us would never have seen anything like it, they said.
Homes and lives would be at risk. Farms would turn into lakes, they said.
But many parts of Victoria, particularly around in Melbourne, got little more than constant drizzle over the weekend…
People believed the bureau’s reports and so major events such as the Taste of Melbourne, Polo in the City, Opera in the Bowl, Arts Centre Melbourne’s outdoor Christmas market, Tennis Victoria Premier League and all grades of Victorian Premier Cricket were cancelled.
International flights were diverted and some were delayed.
The reality was a little different…
Despite the fact that 2700 calls for assistance were received, only 73 homes across the state were affected by flooding…READ ALL
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/susie-obrien/why-we-wont-believe-bureau-of-meteorologys-extreme-weather-forecasts/news-story/6d10e68b3df62015ab72ffff1c187132
20
Hi Jo, would like to show my support to you by BPay/ inter-bank transfer… don’t do Paypal. Is there somewhere on your site I can do this? If not, plse provide your details (via email if you prefer).
20
Hi Jo – ok I just found it! Sorry, havinG slow day oday…:)
20
Hi Jo – ok I just found it! Sorry, having a slow day today…:)
10
🙂
x 2
00
Hey Jo why is it I couldn’t see your threads since “I’m speaking this afternoon in Perth — 3 ways to destroy a good electricity grid” for the past few days? I only just caught up on the new ones just now. Have I been a naughty boy or something and was banned based on on my ip-address from seeing the subsequent threads?
20
PeterS –
you aren’t the only one. for some reason, the Perth speaking engagement thread kept going back to the top of all the new threads, for some reason or other.
not sure it was every time, but most times. it got very confusing. hopefully, all is back to normal now.
20
Sorry, the speaking post was a “sticky” post to put it at the top, which I don’t use often, and I completely forgot. Oops. But it’s dropped back to its rightful place now. Apologies for that confusion. I see each post one at a time and rarely look at the “home” page.
00
Jo just had that article as a sticky. The other articles appeared next down all week.
40
bobl –
wondered if that was the case. thanx for the explanation.
20
Yes, thanks bobl for the explanation.
10
Just as well Daniel “the Genius” Andrews ordered all that water from the desal plant when the dams were at 63% full.
50
They’re still at it. This from our local paper today:
THE Bureau of Meteorology has issued severe thunderstorm warnings for Queensland, including the possibility of storms later today across Townsville.
BoM forecaster David Bernard said there was a storm system tracking just south of Mount Stuart but there was no lightning.
It is hot and humid, BUT DRY.
50
way too funny –
3 Dec: ClimateChangeNews: Kevin Rudd: ‘I don’t know how Malcolm Turnbull faces his grandkids’
Australia’s former prime minister talks about the failure of his country’s climate policy, the rise of China and the Carmichael coal mine
By Karl Mathiesen
Climate change preoccupies the mind of Kevin Rudd…
It remains foremost in his thoughts and tweets. One of the “great global megatrends”, climate change will define our future as a species, he tells Climate Home News over scones, jam and tea in an Oxford hotel…
“He choked on climate change, he choked on a whole range of policy measures, hence the collective disillusionment with him.”…
In his current life as ***peripatetic statesman, Rudd says he takes every opportunity to criticise the Australian government over its “inertia” on climate change.
“I don’t know how those guys face their kids and grandkids in the morning. I really don’t. I just genuinely don’t,” he said…
The former prime minister spoke to Climate Home News near Oxford University, UK, where he has spent the past several months researching Chinese leader Xi Jinping.
Rudd is an expert on China and head of the New York-based Asia Society Policy Institute. China’s relationship with the world is changing rapidly, he says, with important consequences for climate change…
Within China, Rudd says, “there has not been a lot of progress” on environmental policy. This includes the scaling back of China’s emissions trading scheme launch, which was originally supposed to have been released across multiple sectors of the economy this year. Now, if it does emerge at all in 2017, it is likely to cover only the energy sector…
http://www.climatechangenews.com/2017/12/03/kevin-rudd-i-dont-know-how-malcolm-turnbull-faces-his-grandkids/
***definition of peripatetic: travelling from place to place, in particular working or based in various places for relatively short periods aka having a massive carbon footprint.
30
either an editorial or a “comment” as per the url. editor Alex Lavelle referred to at the end of the piece. couldn’t decide if it was satire or serious but, being Fairfax, finally realised it was serious:
4 Dec: Age: Unfair criticism rains down on the Bureau of Meteorology
Not that many years ago the Bureau of Meteorology was considered about as reliable and useful as a shredded umbrella. Were it to forecast a clear, hot day, the prudent response was to pack a warm coat and wear waterproof boots. These days, the bureau’s professionals, backed by technology and science, are widely trusted to not only nail the next day’s conditions, but to accurately forecast the coming week’s weather.
We are all indebted to the bureau; knowledge of pending rain or heatwaves is of evident value. In particular, people whose livelihood and/or leisure depend on the weather owe so much to the forecasters. Lives have been saved by the bureau’s ability to anticipate extreme events and warn those in peril. Many a festival and many a social and sporting event have been calibrated on the basis of the bureau’s predictions. Farmers determine the fine-tuning of their harvests on the basis of this advice.
So it’s a bit rough that many people have been highly critical of the bureau’s warning late last week that Victoria was in for a full month’s rain over only three days, which would cause flash flooding within built-up areas and river flooding throughout the state, and could cause fatalities. The forecast was essentially correct, with record downpours. In 24 hours, Melbourne received its biggest deluge in a quarter of a century. But it did not fall exactly where predicted, allowing the bureau to cancel on Sunday morning the emergency alerts it triggered on Thursday.
An unnecessarily but diplomatically trite Emergency Management Commissioner Craig Lapsley suggested on Monday that the bureau’s warning had perhaps been unduly strong. But he did not say the bureau got the situation fundamentally wrong, just that its communication could be refined. That is a sensible response, as many people were frightened, events were cancelled, business was lost and people who should no longer climb ladders risked serious injury in panicked sessions of gutter clearing.
It has been a strange time. The warnings of an impending historically massive storm triggered community angst. When the rain came later than forecast, and did not hit Melbourne as hard as tipped, there was, bizarrely, a palpable sense of letdown. But, overall, the event was largely as predicted…
It’s strange that Melburnians are annoyed at the non-appearance of a predicted catastrophe. That’s not likely to be appreciated in those parts of regional Victoria dealing with flooding and crop damage.
The bureau and our emergency services are not cavalier. It would be a grave mistake to discount future warnings because the bureau may have made a rare marginal mistake on this occasion.
•A note from the editor – Subscribers can get Age editor Alex Lavelle’s exclusive weekly newsletter delivered to their inbox by signing up here…
ONE OF TWO COMMENTS POSTED SO FAR:
Mudhoney: A terrific editorial. Thanks The Age (and the BoM).
10
forgot the url – and now note it includes “comment” and “editorial”:
http://www.theage.com.au/comment/the-age-editorial/unfair-criticism-rains-down-on-the-bureau-of-meteorology-20171204-gzydl8.html
10
By exaggerating the potential damage of the storm the Bureau of Mediocrity has “cried wolf” and people are less likely to believe them next time so they have potentially caused huge future damage.
40
By exaggerating the potential damage of the storm the Bureau of Mediocrity has “cried wolf” and people are less likely to believe them next time so they have potentially caused huge future damage.
20
Ah, a highly trustworthy source: The Huffington and Puffingtion Post being apologetic for their friends at Climate Catastrophe Central.
It is one thing to give a major flood watch for a general area than giving a clear assertion that an catastrophic flood will happen over a specific area.
The thing is that meteorologists can only report what they expect to happen rather than cause it happen. Some humility would be a virtue.
They should clearly say “our best guess this is what is going to happen. Be prepared just in case. Although, as with all forecasts, conditions can change without warning for better or for worse. Especially for your specific location.”
As Neal Bohr once said: “Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future.”
40
I enjoyed a game of golf in Melbourne on Saturday morning with very few players on the course. I confess that I did employ my umbrella on a few occasions and cleaned my glasses more than once.
Having grown used to the occasional cyclone which hits my current home in Far Norther Queensland and become a bit blaze about downpours of 150mm, I’m so glad that is the worst weather Melbourne will ever suffer ever again.
The big question is what the BoM will do next time. Do they do a spinal tap and turn it up to 11?
30
In Britain we can get a text from our power supplier when weather might affect supply.
” We are expecting bad weather Wednesday evening and Thursday and you are registered for our priority services. We would like to remind you that you can call 1 0 5 or 0800 300 999 if you experience a loss of power. Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks ”
That prompted me to Google which reveals we are expecting Hurricane ‘Caroline’ , the third to be named by the UK Met Office this season. What happened to the stiff upper lip ?
00