The Australian Weather Forum

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 9:17 am**

28mm here. MTD is now 143mm, which makes this our wettest month since April 2017 when we had 172mm.

We have orange mud-stained puddles here as well. Really surprised, as I didn't expect the muddy rain to keep going. Will have to do some cleaning up later.

Currently raining lightly, but I don't expect much more judging by the radar.

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 9:20 am**

Launceston has had its first 24 hour 20mm rainfall since July 11th 2019. 25 mm has fallen in Hobart - the last time Hobart had >25mm was February 7th 2019.

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 9:30 am**

Ended up with 2.5mm. Only 10% of what the forecast models were suggesting just last night. I doubt that I've seen a worse mismatch and bigger fail.

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 9:46 am**

StratoBendigo wrote: ↑Thu Jan 23, 2020 9:30 am Ended up with 2.5mm. Only 10% of what the forecast models were suggesting just last night. I doubt that I've seen a worse mismatch and bigger fail.

You definitely seem to be in a bad luck run. I know this sounds stupid but are you using an electronic gauge? Can i suggest it may be faulty. You constantly report substantially lower rain readings then everyone else around you.

Either that or your area is under a spell

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 10:11 am**

Nope. Old school gauge which is very accurate.

BOM rainfall maps concur.

Some areas SW of here have reported even less than me. Dustbowl.

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 10:22 am**

Had 28 mm by the manual gauges, only 23 mm with the Davis ws, have bad feeling it is not recording correctly as previously it would normally be a touch higher. Similar discrepancy with last rain event. Melbourne Water Rowville about 2 kms away has had 27 mm.

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 11:03 am**

31.5mm for us, so all is forgiven for the Sunday/ Monday miss! 77mm mtd, which is more than our entire Jan-April total last year. Good to see plenty of other nice falls, although Strato, that is a complete bummer for you

.

I was up most of the night waiting for the red rain to go away so I could turn the tank off divert and catch some clean water; got about 8mm worth and probably missed a few mm before that.

I would be fascinated to hear from the experts how the red rain persisted for so long? It was a first in my 25 years here; in fact I can't recall it ever in my lifetime. Occasionally, we get a few red drops as a front moves through over a dusty atmosphere, but to have hours of red rain behind the front, exceeding 20mm worth? Trying to work out how that is possible? And in southern Vic at least, it may be unprecedented?

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 11:16 am**

Gordon wrote: ↑Thu Jan 23, 2020 11:03 am 31.5mm for us, so all is forgiven for the Sunday/ Monday miss! 77mm mtd, which is more than our entire Jan-April total last year. Good to see plenty of other nice falls, although Strato, that is a complete bummer for you .

I was up most of the night waiting for the red rain to go away so I could turn the tank off divert and catch some clean water; got about 8mm worth and probably missed a few mm before that.

I would be fascinated to hear from the experts how the red rain persisted for so long? It was a first in my 25 years here; in fact I can't recall it ever in my lifetime. Occasionally, we get a few red drops as a front moves through over a dusty atmosphere, but to have hours of red rain behind the front, exceeding 20mm worth? Trying to work out how that is possible? And in southern Vic at least, it may be unprecedented?

There's quite an irony with half of Australia's top soil being lifted into the air and dumped on Melbourne...

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 11:29 am**

I too would be interested to hear others thoughts on the mud rain, just spent 2 hours cleaning outdoor seating, deck, back porch and railings and numerous bird baths of desert sludge. It feels like I have changed location, I have new respect for those who live with this occurrence regularly... i know I couldn't, hope this does not become the norm, and as others have said the topsoil dressing the garden has just received is about the only good thing to come from it and the reduced fire risk.
20mls and 109 MTD.

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 11:39 am**

Good to see you got a decent drink tassiedave, bad to see you’ve again missed out strato. It’s getting ridiculous now considering the systems that have gone through.

29mm of water and 5mm of topsoil here meanwhile. Great for the garden (iron boost) bad for the farmers out west.

Would love to see this pattern shift extend into the autumn months. Whether it can persist we’ll just have to wait and see, but with a fair whack of moisture up north, I don’t think it’s over.

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 1:48 pm**

Compared to other areas in SE Australia it must look like i've got my PWS outdoor sensor in the fridge!
A good thick misty day at Mt Macedon.

: Screenshot_2020-01-23-13-44-05.png (207.58 KiB) Viewed 8851 times

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 3:34 pm**

Im not attempting any clean up yet.
and Ideally would have used tank water..
the pics of pools around Im tipping my tanks will only be putting red water on red Mud..

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 3:49 pm**

Just my thoughts on the red rain. We have had many times when dust has been blown over us but have we had other times when it has been immediately followed by such a significant rainfall event to bring it to earth rather than being blown further thus dissipating it?

YTD is 97 mm

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 4:21 pm**

StratoBendigo wrote: ↑Thu Jan 23, 2020 11:16 am There's quite an irony with half of Australia's top soil being lifted into the air and dumped on Melbourne...

I just tipped out 13mm of red water from my manual gauge - from last 24hrs. My Davis indicated 1.4mm (it's not normally that far off)! Could it be caked in Coober Pedy opal dust?? Worth the thought (I am going to check mine).

Edit: sure enough, water was in the cone - it's release blocked by opal dust and bird droppings.

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 4:46 pm**

Next Thursday forecast: Hobart 30, Melbourne 35, Adelaide 40, Mildura 42

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 6:18 pm**

Rainband kinda ran out of puff so didn’t add a whole lot more to the total in FC. Finished on 31mm, which is a very handy fall, though perhaps a touch below what the models had. Puts our MTD to about 170mm. Best January for a long while

39mm in Walkerville. About 30mm from the rainband then the rest with a ripper coldie just before noon. Was and absolute cracker - torrential rain, small hail and sideways gales (or worse). Crazy winds for a few minutes

Lot of water standing in the paddocks this arvo, which will be great for grass growth for the farmers here in the coming month or two.

Great system for much of the state, though bit of a miss for parts of north central and the far east and lower northeast. Shame that this system didn’t drop good falls on the active fires out in East Gippsland.

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 7:57 pm**

Interesting observation here, Melbourne & Adelaide's current 5-day Temperature outlook are almost identical. You don't often see that in summer

Adelaide definitely running cooler for January.

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 8:38 pm**

Big miss for the NW and East Gippy little again for them, Bendgio Nortyh and SA border got little, most of Murray missed out too.

Central did very well but dont really need it here amazing wet Jan

46mm last 4 days and over 100mm for the month everything is green

Nice long strecth of warm sunny weather ahead hot Thurs to Sun next week

Amazing few weeks

PS Red rain was amazing but the constant NWly of the rain and wind just kept dropping the dust over us for hours saw that in Mildura alot but not with 20mm amazing.

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 8:39 pm**

Gordon wrote: ↑Thu Jan 23, 2020 11:03 am I would be fascinated to hear from the experts how the red rain persisted for so long? It was a first in my 25 years here; in fact I can't recall it ever in my lifetime. Occasionally, we get a few red drops as a front moves through over a dusty atmosphere, but to have hours of red rain behind the front, exceeding 20mm worth? Trying to work out how that is possible? And in southern Vic at least, it may be unprecedented?

Never seen anything like it before. Seeing the photos of a red/brown Yarra is astonishing. I’ve seen plenty of dusty rain events with a few mms max, but nothing like it. Dreading seeing our pool when we get home, as these dirty rain events are like sprinkling fertiliser on the pool, so water goes brown, then cloudy the wants to turn green

Usually takes a few days to get it clean. Hopefully most settled on the pool blanket.

Gut feeling is that the combination of an intense drought (record bad in parts of inland Oz), and intense winter like synoptic system, and a big stratiform rain event with a large area of upslide is so unusual that it would just about never happen.

Posted: **Thu Jan 23, 2020 10:14 pm**

Rain from 9 am: Upper Blessington 35mm, Meander 23mm, Mt Barrow 22mm, Geeveston 12mm, Launceston 10mm, Wynyard 7.8mm, Hobart 2.2mm

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