Extreme weather events dominate Australia in 2016, report says
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Weather
Sydney, Jan. 5, 2017 (dpa/NAN) Australians endured unusually warm and wet conditions in 2016 with fierce fires and damaging floods, a government agency said on Thursday in its new annual climate report.
The Bureau of Meteorology said in their report that it was a year of extreme weather events.
It said that it was wetter than average overall and the fourth-warmest on record for Australia (since the national observational data set began in 1910).
“The year started off very warm and dry, with bush fires in Victoria, Tasmania and Western Australia.
“A nation-wide heatwave from late February to mid-March,” Neil Plummer, Assistant Director for Climate Information Services, said.
The warmest autumn on record was partly due to a very strong 2015–16 El Niño.
“It broke down in May with a dry start followed by record wet for the next five months due to significant change in sea surface temperatures in the Pacific.
“Widespread, drought-breaking rains led to flooding in multiple states.
“Even Northern Australia saw widespread rainfall, during what is usually the dry season, greening regions that had been in drought for several years,” Plummer said.
The annual rainfall, as a whole for Australia, was 17 per cent above average.
“Normally, with that amount of rainfall, you’d expect it to be a reasonably cool year but it’s come out as one of the warmest on record.
“Part of that is the influence of global warming in the oceans and in the atmosphere,” Climate Scientist Karl Braganza said.
The report said the country recorded a national mean temperature of 0.87 degrees Celsius above average, its fourth-warmest year on record.
Sea surface temperatures around Australia were the warmest on record with 0.77 degrees Celsius above average. (dpa/NAN)
OYE/AFA
Edited by Celine-Damilola Oyewole/Felix Ajide
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