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BoM says January was hottest month on record for Australia

16 Comments

But checking various Jan Mean Max’s across Oz shows a lot of places missed out.
FAIL Adelaide no record West Terrace 33 but 34.2 in 1908
FAIL Perth coolest for a decade –
Kalgoorlie had an 11 day data gap in Jan. too unimportant to repair.
FAIL Leonora Aero hit 39.3 but started life in 2008 with 39.4 – Leonora 12046 hit 40.4 in 1956 – 40.2 in 1957 and 41.1 in 1959.
FAIL Warburton Airfield scored 40.9 last month but hit 42.1 in 1979.
FAIL Marble Bar 4106 hit 43.7 but saw 44.6 in 2005 Marble Bar Comp 4020 also hit 44.6 in 2005 but saw 44.4 in 1910 and 1922 and 44.2 in 1929 and 44 in 1930.
Laughable Sydney 29.6 equal with record in 2017 in centre largest Australian UHI
FAIL Richmond RAAF 67105 hit 33.8 but saw 34.1 in 2017 and 34.2 in 2018. Richmond RAAF 67033 saw 34 in 1946. Richmond – UWS Hawkesbury 67021 saw 34.1 in 1946.
FAIL Bourke Aero hit 42.6 a record but Bourke Post Office read 43.4 in 1896.
FAIL Broken Hill Airport hit a record 38.3 but Patton Street saw 38.5 in 1898
FAIL Melbourne Olympic Park 28.4 but the now closed Regional Office was 30.6 in 2015, 28.6 in 2014, 2009, too many others to list but 31 in 1908.
FAIL Mildura Airport saw a record 37.8 but the Post Office blitzed that with 39 in 1906 and 38.2 in 1939.
Dubious Canberra 34.5 but Queanbeyan Bowling Club had Jan Mean max 34.2 in 1932 so I think with Canberra suburbs UHI and the explosion in Airport urbanization this century the BoM claim for Canberra 2019 is dodgy.
FAIL Darwin Airport hit 32.7 vs record 33.4 1970 – but the Post Office saw 34.9 in 1892
Tennant Creek Airport was 41.6 vs a record 40.4
Alice Springs Airport was 41.5 vs a record 40 but the Post Office was 40.7 in 1887
FAIL Brisbane saw 31.9 but the Regional Office was 32.3 in 1903.
FAIL Longreach Aero made 39 but has a record of 39.9 in 2013 and 1992 – the Post Office hit 41.4 in 1947 and 40.8 in 1902.
Hobart hit 26.1 which was a record since 25 in 2003. But at Botanic Gardens it was 27 in 1841 but possibly thermometer may not have been in a BoM approved enclosure.
FAIL Launceston 91237 hit 27.3 a record but Launceston (City) 91049 saw 27.7 in 1887 and 28.5 in 1908.

16 thoughts on “BoM says January was hottest month on record for Australia”

  3. No cherry-picking – I actually avoided some coastal areas that were not anomalously hot – I simply looked at places where Aussies live – more to come Sunday. So easy to shoot holes in BoM inspired media beatups.

  4. I think you need to have a close look at what you are doing before “more to come Sunday.”

    As you have exposed your motive is “to shoot holes in BoM inspired media beatups.” then you risk being paid back in your own coin.

    It is childishly simple to riddle your post with so many holes that it wouldn’t serve as chicken-wire.

    You are simply scouring huge swathes of temperature data and picking out the bits that confirm your ideology. If you want to sample you have to apply a sensible sampling technique – BEFORE you look at the data.

  5. Chris – I have examined weather stations data where people live – where there is hope of long term data – if you know of other century old data where Jan 2019 was a January mean max record please post. Here is a clue – there could be some in NSW. It is pointless you talking about “sampling” as if there was some continent wide even spaced recording of historic temperatures that can be ideally sampled. Never happened. Century old weather station mostly started in towns plus a few at lighthouses.
    Here are a few additions for today. Have a good day now.

    Monster Fail Whyalla Aero 18120 which read 32.5 last month but hit 35 for Jan 2001.
    Port Augusta saw a record 37.1 last month. Just 0.2 above 36.9 in 1939
    Fail Wagga Wagga AMO 72150 which read 37.9 last month but Wagga Wagga (Kooringal) monstered that in 1890 with 38.8 and there were several others.
    Tamworth made a record 37.9 last month
    Just Fail at Armidale where Airport hit 31.1 last month but Armidale Radio saw 31.9 in 1862 and 31.1 in 1896.
    Fail Bathurst Airport hit a record 33.1 last month but Bathurst Gaol hit 35.1 in 1878, 34.7 1872 and 34.4 in 1896.
    Fail Charleville Aero hit 39.2 last month which was equal to Jan 2018 but the Post Office 44022 hit 40.6 in 1947 and 39.9 in 1940 plus other year higher than 39.2
    Monster Fail Townsville hit 31.5 last month but saw 34.1 in 1994 plus others.
    Fail at Gold Coast too which was 29.9 last month but 1940 was 30 and 1992 30.5.

  6. Yes there may not be a reasonable way to sample based on geography or population.

    However you could sample from the ACORN data all sites that have data that includes 1939 or from an earlier date.

    You then have to decide on a specific month and year and not jump willy-nilly from 1947 in one place 1896 in other and 2001 somewhere else.

    The BOM statement concerns a specific unit – month for Australia. Not month speckled across different sites.

    You have to pick a fixed month (MM/YYY) and then sample for all of Australia from the ACORN-SAT data – and describe your sampling.

    If South East Australia is over represented you may need to apply some form of weighting.

  7. ACORN SAT is a BoM dataset which adjusts Australian historic temperature data with the overall effect of cooling the past and inserting fantasy warming into our climate history. But either max or min can be adjusted up or down at various times. ACORN was introduced in 2012 and I have many critical blogs.
    So a corollary of ACORN is that thousands of historic weather station observers around Australia – people like post-mistresses, managers of State Farms and lighthouse keepers – were too incompetent to correctly read their thermometers and record the result. That includes data recorded at official Met Offices with professional BoM staffers!!! BoM is introducing ACORN 2 now.
    Here is the worst example I know of re truly whacko data from ACORN – from Albany south coast WA – the daily max for 8 February 1933 was originally recorded as the degrees F = of 44.8C which ACORN adjusted up to 51.2C.
    Did you get that Chris Warren ? 44.8C for Albany on 8 February 1933 was adjusted to 51.2C.
    So – sorry but I can not take ACORN seriously – JoNova has a blog on this Was the Hottest Day Ever in Australia not in a desert, but in far south Albany?!
    ScribeWorks has done a huge amount of work explaining ACORN both 1 and 2.

  8. I’ve been monitoring WA’s 12 month rolling min and max since 2009 at www.waclimate.net, where I compare temps at the 32 oldest sites in WA with their averages from around the year 1900 (a cooler baseline than the bureau’s 1961-90).

    Since January is the current hot topic I checked the averaged max at all 32 stations for January 2019 … 32.1C.

    That compares with …

    Jan 2018 – 31.2C
    Jan 2017 – 31.5C
    Jan 2016 – 31.6C
    Jan 2015 – 32.4C
    Jan 2014 – 32.1C
    Jan 2013 – 32.6C
    Jan 2012 – 31.6C
    Jan 2011 – 32.4C
    Jan 2010 – 33.2C
    Jan 2009 – 32.4C

    So at the 32 stations, four of the 2009-2018 Januarys were hotter and Jan 2014 was the same as last month.

    ACORN has 25 WA stations. I consider 32 a better average. The BoM says Jan 2019 was the hottest ever at 2.33C above the 1961-90 anomaly baseline.

    Below are the 25 WA ACORN stations with Jan 2019 first and their record second …

    Albany 24.3 26.6
    Bridgetown 29.7 33.0
    Broome 34.0 35.7
    Cape Leeuwin 22.4 25.1
    Carnarvon 31.9 35.5
    Cunderdin 35.4 37.5
    Dalwallinu 35.6 38.0
    Esperance 26.4 28.3
    Eucla 29.3 30.1
    Forrest 35.3 37.0
    Geraldton 31.0 36.2
    Giles 40.5 40.3 (hooray, a winner!)
    Halls Creek 38.8 40.3
    Kalgoorlie 34.9 36.7
    Kalumburu 36.4 36.7
    Katanning 30.2 33.2
    Learmonth 39.5 41.4
    Marble Bar 43.7 44.6
    Meekatharra 41.0 42.1
    Merredin 35.2 37.4
    Morawa 37.7 39.9
    Perth 31.3 35.6
    Port Hedland 37.4 39.4
    Wandering 31.9 34.8
    Wittenoom 42.4 43.0

    Yes, the records aren’t in the same year but you’d think that in the hottest January ever recorded in WA, a few more could get even close to their record apart from Giles which just snuck over the line – particularly since much of the west coast and south-west were below average including Perth with its coolest max in a decade (and Swanbourne with its coolest ever Jan max).

    So apart from whoever looks after the Giles thermometer, nobody in WA suffered through their hottest ever January despite it being the hottest January ever in WA.

    However, the couple of million who live around Lancelin, Perth Metro, Bunbury, Dalwallinu and Wandering last month had their coldest Jan min on record.

    The BoM’s climate tracker (www.bom.gov.au/climate/change/index.shtml#tabs=Tracker&tracker=timeseries&tQ=graph%3Dtmax%26area%3Dwa%26season%3D01%26ave_yr%3D0), which is ACORN based, shows that for January maxima in WA the 1961-90 average was 35.6C. The Jan 2019 averages I’ve listed above average 34.2C.

  9. Chris Gillham

    By cherry-picking years AND not even stating which year you have picked, (after looking at the data) – you have only made matters worse.

    Such efforts are political, not meteorological.

    Even dreaming of such a vain exercise is naive. It is not necessary for every jurisdiction to have a record for Australia as a whole to have a record – in anything.

  11. Useful link Beachgirl. I’ve been waiting for Roy to post on this. It’s good that we at least have two climate scientists (Roy Spencer and John Christy) who are also meteorologists.

    Follw the link Chris.

  12. TedM, Beachgirl…

    Judging from the comments at your link, I think Spencer may be feeling very sorry he ever tried to impute the work of the Bureau.

    He should just stay in his own corral.

  13. BoM beating up a few hot days due in Perth – about time they saw some hot days.
    Perth weather to soar into high 30s in the longest run of hot days since 2014 6Feb19
    www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-05/perth-weather-set-for-hottest-streak-in-five-years/10782408
    Perth weather forecast
    Wednesday: Sunny, 20-36
    Thursday: Very hot, possible afternoon storm, 21-38
    Friday: Possible morning storm, 20-35
    Saturday: Very hot and sunny, 20-38
    Sunday: Very hot and mostly sunny, 23-40
    Monday: Sunny, 20-34

  14. Chris Warren: I’m interested in the climate scientist/meteorologist with the data, not the comments that may have been made by a few of your colleagues.

  15. TedM

    I’m interested in the climate scientist/meteorologists with the data, not the comments and slanders made by a few denialists.

  16. Chris Gillam:

    I understand that Gilles is now an automated station. Chris Warren could no doubt tell me if I am wrong.

    Re record temperature in Adelaide of 46.6℃ eclipsing the previous one in 1939 of 46.1.
    I note: “Adelaide is sweltering through its hottest day in 130 years of records, with the mercury reaching 46.6 degrees just after 3.30pm. The temperature beats the city’s 80-year-old previous record of 46.1 set on January 12, 1939”.
    The West Terrace weather station recorded the historic reading at 3.36pm. but recorded 45.2 at 3.50 p.m. & 4.00 p.m. No nearby weather stations recorded a 1.4℃ drop (or any) in temperature in 14 minutes.

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