Another big slow moving high: April 27-

[hillybilly]

Thread for the next long long spell of nothing weather. This time a very slow and big high anchored in the bight that looks like dominating the weather for a week or two. Will be southwesterly tending southeasterly flow so some showers near the coasts, but for most just cool autumn weather.

[hillybilly]

Front through this morning with zilch rain for Hobart and Melbourne

Perhaps the odd stream shower to come with the big high. Lots and lots of rain in NSW. Looks quite concerning on the coast up there.

[Skywalker]

Another rather uneventful front this morning. Think I counted 5 drops on the roof.

[snowfall]

A bit of a humdrum phase of weather. A big dominant high to our west and south and patterns generally stuck. It has been raining on and off here this morning from a southeasterly stream of showers, but has only produced 1mm so far. Feeling chilly though, especially in the wind.

We'll finish April with 156mm, two-thirds of which landed in the deluge we had on the first couple of days of the month. There was a distinct lack of warm spike days this year, with lots of southerlies and few northerlies, so our max temp (16.3c) has averaged around 2 degrees below the long term. The minimum is only slightly below. But a generally cool April compared to the usual.

[Tassiedave]

Hobart has received just 85.6mm of rain so far this year. Jan - April average is 151.6mm

[Gordon]

Cold and quite damp April here, maximums 1.5C below average, but lack of sun probably made it feel colder. 82.5mm of rain versus 57mm average. YTD of 174.5mm is however below our 28 year average of 222mm.

[hillybilly]

0.4mm of drizzle here yesterday. That might be it for the week. Pressure currently on 1035hPa and rising.

April was another ordinary month here. Just shy of 40mm. YTD is about 100mm, or just over half of what it should be.

Btw the IOD has jumped to +0.7. That’s above the usual threshold, but just a weekly value. Hopefully just an aberration as we don’t need back to back positive IODs. Throw in a La Niña and your analogues are 1938 and 2008. Of course too early to make anything concrete out of this, but something to watch.

[StratoBendigo]

1043 HPa High in the Bight atm. Is that a record? Must be close to it.

50mm for us in April (nearly all on April 1), and below average Min and Max temps including 3 frosts.

It does feel like 2008 tbh.

[hillybilly]

Geez progs just keep the high going. Latest GFS has zilch for two weeks and on day 14 the high is still about 1035hPa over the top of us.

Never seen anything like this before. Drought is starting to break records across lots of southern Australia now, with the exception of VIC which has had those sneaky lows.

[hillybilly]

First proper frost here for the year. Around 3C in the horse paddock, so pretty patchy.

Highs just roll on.

We might sneak some coastal showers here in the east coast, but looking at VIC, seeing little to none the next 14 days.

[Gordon]

An unexpected 1mm from drizzly showers last night.

Fine again now, but perhaps a sniff of something from a trough dipping south over Vic at the end of the week?

[hillybilly]

An unexpected 1mm from drizzly showers last night.

Fine again now, but perhaps a sniff of something from a trough dipping south over Vic at the end of the week?

Does look like some local showers and drizzle for parts of VIC around Friday. Slow moving so suspect very hit and miss.

TAS looks like getting one of the best falls for the east coast in weeks the next 24 hours with surface pressures round 1035 hPa Front stalls in the middle of the high. Hoping for about 10mm here, and might well see some of the higher east facing hills get 20-30mm.

Not sure about others but i am struggling to remember such persistent highs for weeks on end. Feels like the start to an El Niño drought but we are meant to be seeing a La Niña

[Tassiedave]

Only 0.8mm of rain in Launceston in the last 12 days. We look like getting through to the 13th May at least with no rain for May.

[Gordon]

Not sure about others but i am struggling to remember such persistent highs for weeks on end. Feels like the start to an El Niño drought but we are meant to be seeing a La Niña

I get it, and agree re persistent highs. After decades of thinking I understood climate drivers and climate forecasts to the point of being able to get at least some value from them, I'm all but dismissing them now - at least for my area. For example, BOM's 21 March forecast for April for us was for warm and dry - but April turned out cool and wet! I have some confidence in forecasts out to about a week, but that's it. Any further and it's just a blank for me

[snowfall]

What has really stood out to me is just how stuck the synoptic patterns have been over the past 6 months. It’s not unusual to have blocking highs or repeating troughs, but the highs in particular have been stuck for very long periods, including right now.

I was looking over my records recently and every month since November 2023 has been dominated by southerly winds. That’s pretty typical for a couple of months in summer due to high pressure tracking south of the continent, but not 6 months straight. And now, here we are in May and still in a summer-like pattern. It may have something to do with the IOD having trended positive over the past several weeks, although thankfully it has been weakening recently. Surely, something will give eventually, but not sure when…

[Tassiedave]

Screenshot 2024-05-07 at 8.48.37 PM.png (713.44 KiB) Viewed 210 times

A couple of weak fronts next week and then by May 17th it's established again

[hillybilly]

Geez progs have another monster high for next week into the following week. There are two weak troughs between then and now. First sits over eastern Tasmania today, but won’t affect Victoria, second is a broad easterly dip around Friday which might sneak into northern Victoria and eastern Tasmania. Not too confident on the second one - it could rain down to Melbourne with a few mms or it might stop at the Murray Rivers. Might rain in Hobart or might get stuck in the northeast. It’s a very flat system which dips then weakens.

Not out of the question that Melbourne could get to the last week of May with less than a mm in the gauge.

Edit> thick east coast/Tasman Sea drizzle and fog set in here. Not a big event but this is our first easterly event in months. 6mm so far and still coming down.

[StratoBendigo]

EC is pretty optimistic for a 30mm+ downpour here in Friday from the North. Something to picque my interest for the first time in a while.

[hillybilly]

EC is pretty optimistic for a 30mm+ downpour here in Friday from the North. Something to picque my interest for the first time in a while.

Finally a new thread A trough in a high. This one is pumping quite a lot of moisture but doesn’t have a lot of forcing. Still, looks quite good for eastern TAS and northern Victoria, particularly up the middle.

Really strange 36 hours here. Old front stalled over us providing a 3km deep unstable layer tapping really moist Tasman sea air. Had fog to sea level and drizzle in easterlies for 24 hours without a break. Few spots on big hills scored 30mm. Weve had 11mm which is the best event in a month, with a surface pressure of 1037hPa