When will the darn rain stop? And will the weather ever just be normal? The answers are Tuesday (probably),and yes,but increasingly rarely.
Scientia Professor Matthew England,a climate scientist at the University of NSW,said climate change is bringing more heat waves and more days of extreme rainfall. This meant fewer days of so-called ordinary weather.
“We will still have days of normal weather conditions as our climate changes,but interspersed will be increasingly frequent extreme climate events,including days with flooding rains as well as days with severe heat waves,” England said. “This is one of the many costs of our ongoing carbon emissions and climate change.”
Last year was the hottest in history globally,and the equal-eighth hottest in Australia,accompanied by a marine heat wave that has persisted into 2024. Weather across the continent has ranged from an extreme wet season in northern Queensland with metres of rain to forests drying out and dying in Western Australia.
Climate Council head of research Dr Simon Bradshaw said “normal weather” was the relatively stable climate humans had enjoyed for thousands of years,with seasonal variations and occasional extreme weather. While Australia had always experienced swings between hot,dry weather and heavy rain,this has been amplified.
“We mustn’t delude ourselves into thinking that what we’re seeing is normal,” Bradshaw said.
“We have permanently changed the context in which our weather is forming. We’ve created an atmosphere that is warmer,is wetter,and has more energy for powerful storms,and that is due to climate pollution from the burning of coal,oil and gas.”
Bradshaw said climate instability would continue for a few decades,but making serious cuts to greenhouse emissions now would have a big impact later this century,and Australia could influence the global outcome as a big fossil fuel exporter and potential clean energy superpower.
England said warmer ocean water in the Coral and Tasman seas had increased humidity in the atmosphere,increasing the odds of heavy rainfalls on the east coast. That is why the Australian summer experienced the seemingly contradictory phenomenon of the wet El Nino,a climate driver that usually means hot,dry conditions.
The melting of sea ice and glaciers in Antarctica further compounds the long-term outlook not only because of sea level rises,but because the cooler meltwater could interrupt the ocean warming trends. that climate change would mean a more El Nino-like future for Australia – more droughts,higher bushfire risks,more heat waves – might be wrong. If the Antarctic meltwater cools the Pacific Ocean,it could mean Australia’s future is more La Nina,the climate driver that generally means cool,rainy conditions.
CSIRO agriculture scientist Lindsay Bell said the increasing climate variability was challenging for farmers,and “wet seasons can be just as challenging to manage as dry seasons for most dryland producers”.
In mid-April the Bureau of Meteorology had on the east coast. Instead,it has rained in Sydney every day of May so far,with more to come.
Dr Andrew King,a climate scientist at the University of Melbourne,said weather forecasting for the few days ahead was increasingly accurate,but seasonal outlooks remained difficult.
Sydney’s Observatory Hill weather station is set to record its 10th consecutive day of rain by 9am on Friday. Bureau of Meteorology senior meteorologist Jordan Notara said the when it rained for 17 days.
Notara said the Sydney forecast was for showers throughout Thursday and Friday,followed by a wet Saturday with the potential for localised flash flooding in Sydney and the Illawarra.
Notara said the weather was likely to clear by next Monday or Tuesday,and there was a chance the sun could return by Sunday,in time for Mother’s Day.
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