Maleny Weather

A high over the Tasman Sea will continue to maintain moderate to fresh South-east trade winds on to the Ranges for the rest of the week. A few isolated showers can be expected but the weather will be mostly fine for our region

The week started with a thunderstorm on Monday evening with some moderate falls of rain filling rain gauges. It’s been a week of sunshine and showers with temperatures in the mid-twenties. This month’s Relative Humidity has been the highest recorded in March for several years.  Bright Sunshine for the week was 36 hours.  A low pressure system in the Coral Sea was expected to turn into a tropical cyclone, but an upper level atmospheric environment was not favourable for this to happen and instead moved the low farther away from the coast into cooler waters.

A deal has been signed today to create two new supercomputers in Australia to forecast weather and track climate change.

The Australian National University and the Bureau of Meteorology will build the new computers at the ANU campus in Canberra and in Melbourne.

 The head of ANU Supercomputing Facility, Ben Evans, says the new ANU system is expected to be operational by the end of the year, and would be among the world’s top 30 high performance computing systems.

Acting Director of the Bureau of Meteorology Dr Neville Smith says it will give researchers the extra processing power needed to do more demanding climate forecasts.  “Together the new supercomputers will provide the computer power needed to develop the Australian Community Climate and Earth System Simulator – a new project to tie together weather forecasting as well as climate and ocean forecasts,” he said.

The new supercomputers are expected to be operational later this year.

With every country seeking to satisfy its water needs from limited water resources, some foresee a future filled with conflict. But history shows that cooperation, not conflict, is the most common response to trans-boundary water management issues. “Shared water, shared opportunities” is the theme for World Water Day 2009 on 22^nd March

Whether we live upstream or downstream, we are all in the same boat.

About 8,000 people were without power after a line of severe storms brought damaging winds and heavy rain to parts of south-east Queensland Monday evening

The Insurance Council of Australia says the damage bill from last November’s storms in south-east Queensland has topped $310 million.

An undersea volcano has erupted near the Tongan capital Nuku’alofa, sending plumes of steam and smoke hundreds of metres into the air.

1286

King Alexander III of Scotland died when he was blown off a cliff at Inverkeithing, Scotland by a violent easterly gale.

1925

The infamous Tri-State Tornado raced 219 miles across Missouri, Illinois and Indiana. to become the deadliest single tornado in U.S. history. The storm left 695 people dead, 2,027 injured and an estimated $17 million dollars in damage with 15,000 homes totally levelled.

1978

28 people were killed and 300 injured as a tornado touched down and stayed on the ground for over three miles in the northern suburbs of New Delhi, India

1990.

An intense hailstorm struck the Sydney region in Australia producing strong winds and heavy rain in a swathe from Camden to Narrabeen, causing extensive damage.  Hailstones were measured up to 3 inches in diameter.  The total insured damage was estimated at $314 million Australian dollars,

2006

Cyclone Larry, the most powerful storm to hit Australia in 3 decades, slammed onto the Australian coast south of Cairns in the town of Innisfail with estimated sustained winds of 115 mph with gusts to 150 mph devastating sugar and banana plantations and leaving thousands homeless.  Damage totalled a half billion dollars.  Miraculously, no lives were lost and no serious injuries were reported.  At one point, Category 5 Larry packed wind gusts to Category 5 strength of 180 mph.