Victoria: Thunderstorm Outbreak. October 28th-November 3rd 2009 #2

A quick 2mm this morning from the band. Thought I heard one rumble - but could have been my tummy Event total on 45mm which is far better than I had hoped... though realise not all were so lucky. Shame everyone didn't do so well...

Looks to be pretty much over now. Just a few showers in the SW and maybe a bit of drizzle. Is a fairly moist SW stream so could be worth a few mm up here the next two days (and there is a weak front to follow tomorrow). One thing I wouldn't rule out is the odd rogue heavy shower developing in the humid air mass left behind the "rain band" and ahead of the wind change which is due mid arvo through central areas. Also should see the band fire up as it move east under a warming sun.

Pretty impressive radar sequence the last 12 hours (http://radar.strikeone.net.au/?fuseaction=loops.main&radar=022&numberofImages=50&dateStart=1257152400&dateFinish=1257238800). The Mortlake storm the stand out. Can understand the frustration that all the action missed Melbourne - bad luck with the timing in the end with the trough slow to come through meaning we missed the daytime trigger.

BTW EC/GFS suggest a quick return to NE flow next weekend with conditions getting quite humid (precipitable water approaching 30mm). Could start to see a return to a convective set up if that eventuates, though at this stage is a long way off and marginal).

morning all, 1.5mm reported here from that overnight band. Event is finally over here, time to concentrate on the gardening.

I went to bed at 10.30pm with the idea of getting up 2 hours later and seeing what was unfolding...and not much was, so back to bed. trough was delayed by 6 hours which didnt help our cause, NSW this arvo will reap the rewards with some heating..

Well, did we get anything?

I'm glad I stuck to my guns with this one and didn't stay up until 5am-6am to see a weak band of drizzle come through. By the look of how dry the ground is this morning I'm surprised if we even got that. I tried to stay positive but by around 10pm it looked fairly obvious it was not going to happen for us.

It's going to be very difficult to remain enthusiastic about all things weather related when you look at the continuing pattern that the models are showing, high pressure dominance is back with a vengeance and that means heat, heat and more heat. Not looking like a good summer at all now because things will certainly dry out in 2 weeks time if the current model scenario pans out.

hillybilly wrote:Event total on 45mm which is far better than I had hoped... though realise not all were so lucky. Shame everyone didn't do so well...

Most people didn't do so well with this one. I've always been of the opinion that these sort of convective/stormy patterns are not good for us as a whole down here. Most places miss out most of the time and of course to get conditions conducive to these storm outbreaks you need a lot of heat for an extended period of time and the land dries out.

I'd even go as far as to say these extended hot, humid and unstable periods we tend to get a lot of now are part of the climate change pattern that is causing our permanent drought.

Checking this morning we got all of 2.5 mm for this mainly ealy this morning taking the total here to about 4mm...glad I switched off the tanks.

Well after a brilliant night with three thunderstorms, 1 of them severe, I am also glads its over. I dont want our Summer storms to be all buggered by the time Summer actually gets here....

But yes, some areas missed out, it has to be expected, but on the plus side, some people did well! We had 8.6mm to 9am, 5mm of that was from our 2nd thunderstorm last night that was the severe one. Looking back on radar it was a beauty!

As DJ mentioned, and I think I did the other day, EC returns the warm and humid northeast flow from the weekend, so unstable conditions possibly developing around then so more chances to possibly come!

Models look terrible IMO. Massive high pressure dominance through all levels of the atmosphere and no real sign of a trough dipping down into VIC. It may be humid but I wouldn't be expecting storms in the next week and a half. Only chance would be NE ranges at this stage.

Well no rain hre at all, a decent amount of wind! enough to turn the clothes line inside out in fact.. haha.

Anyway here is a couple of photo's from my lookout of the first Mansfield Storm as it was developing. Shot at full 200mm in alot of wind, so they arnet the best, but you get the idea...


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Wonderful shots Rik!!

Nice end to the sequencce. It is nice to have a cooler day. Event total is 50.4mm here after 2.4mm this morning.

Nice pics Rik!

I went down to Edithvale and Black Rock shortly after, I was deciding on going down to Flinders/Cape Schank on the way to Edithvale as I could see Flashes heading that way (wish I did in the end) but was hoping the front would produce some action from the NW which never happend.

Here's a pic from Black Rock, it was barely worth pulling the camera out

The high ridging thats progged by EC and GFS is almost scarey over the coming week at one stage it has it ridging from the Central Indian Ocean to Central Pacific! Surely this can't happen! At this early stage Looks to be a dryish November but I have been saying this for months now that September be good this year October would be better than last year as well (though still some areas that didn't do well) and November and December will be dry followed by a stormy and wet January and February so basically the next 4 months I think will be a reverse of Last Summer. Its rare to get a wet or even average rainfall November in El Nino years, the past 4 El nino this has happened love to be wrong and get a good November in an El nino year.

OK lets not get ahead of ourselves seeing as it is the 3rd day of the month. It could be dry, but apparently we wern't supposed to have rain just the weekend gone.

Looks like moisture building up next week and I think showers and storms will develop by mid next week in humid NE winds.

Long fetching isobaric flow will cause things to slowly build up over the coming week plus the storage of moisture in the NW may come into play.

Huh Karl?? We have had this conversation on the phone before Months ago! About what we both thought for September to December period I don't recall you saying lets not get ahead of ourselves then?? Your last comment confuses me. Im baseing my comments regardless what models are or not showing, I have been saying this since Mid year that and touched on it with you about El Nino years and our recent history with Novembers and Decembers only 2 weeks ago again on the phone surely we can have our own opinion on things without telling us to not get ahead of ourselves??
I'm only putting out there what i think doesn't mean I will be accurate but going on current trends which has been for months I don't have a good feel for November and the rest of the year like I said Hopefully I am wrong. If you have a good feeling thats great hopefully your right but I can't be forced to think something that I just don't feel & have felt that way for a long time for the last 2 months of the year. I'll be the 1st to repost this post up again if we get good rains (even close to average) from now til Christmas if I'm actually am getting ahead of myself to show how wrong I am.

Seemed to have lost posts again... hmmmm. I will have another look.

I am not forcing noone to feel anything, your views are your views, this is an open forum and discussion and I will ask questions and call people out on they're forecasts just as people do with mine. It is just so I can understand it better thats all. I don't want this to be a place where people cannot share they're views. It is just turning a little emotional the dialogue on here the last day or so and it is astounding to me.

John I understand that you remember everything that I have said but I can't even remember what I had for breakfast this morning. I think dry and drought conditions will prevail over the western and central ranges region and into the western suburbs, quickly turning green on this side of town. Just local trends coming into play I guess..

Now back on topic...

Weather is fairly windy as I said earlier with some drizzle starting.

One of my posts went missing. I mentioned that we can't always rely on the past to predict the future, in terms of weather events.

Remember those "1 in a 100 year" storms we've had this decade? Been more than one in the 21st century in Melbourne.

It's a little windy here, but the sky is getting cloudier. Interesting that some forecasts still have 5-9mm for the Melbourne metro area today/tonight. I can see some patchy drizzle on the radar, but not much.

This is a clear pattern that has emerged as a feature of climate change down here over the past 8 years at least (since the 2000 La Nina), where we get these massive high pressure ridges building over us that don't budge for weeks on end. It has happened at almost every time of year over the last 5 years, Winter 2006 was a very notable one, March 2008 is a another, there have been others of course at different times of the year.

In the years before 2000 I never remember high pressure dominance like this, only very occasionally would you get anything resembling what the latest models are showing for us. Every now and then this pattern is broken up by a return to 'normal' with frequent systems coming through and average to above average rain. In the last few years this rain has come around November/December. This year it happened to be August to October. Another time it was February, (2005 I'm talking about there) with that massive system. We all get lulled into a dreadfully false sense of security that we are returning to normal rainfall patterns only to return to the crazy upper ridge pattern almost like someone flicking a switch.

The fact that El Nino is well established now only makes the outlook for now until Christmas even more dire.

There is no way we are going to get a good storm outbreak with upper temps forecast as high as the models have atm for next week. They will continue isolated if they develop at all. Let's be honest, this weekend's events were pretty isolated compared to a lot of the storm outbreaks we have here. Sure if you were in the SE suburbs of Melbourne on Friday night/Saturday morning or around the SW coast last night you would disagree but that is just because you were under it and have no concept of what it was like for most of the rest of the state. There would have been a huge amount of drying of the landscape as a result of the heat this weekend and after the next fortnight if the models come off then it will be like the middle of summer basically. We could be talking days in the mid 30s and even some low 40s days in Melbourne by mid month if the model consensus is correct.

This is truly a serious situation we are in atm, the worst it's ever been in fact if things don't change rapidly.

That's my opinion, if others don't agree then feel free to debate it but don't make me feel like I'm some sort of outcast within the group or a troublemaker (I've felt like that a bit over the last couple of days), just because I am not optimistic all the time regardless of the circumstances.

Karl Lijnders wrote:Seemed to have lost posts again... hmmmm. I will have another look.

I am not forcing noone to feel anything, your views are your views, this is an open forum and discussion and I will ask questions and call people out on they're forecasts just as people do with mine. It is just so I can understand it better thats all. I don't want this to be a place where people cannot share they're views. It is just turning for emotional the dialogue on here the last day or so and it is astounding to me.

John I understand that you remember everything that I have said but I can't even remember what I had for breakfast this morning. I think dry and drought conditions will prevail over the western and central ranges region and into the western suburbs, quickly turning green on this side of town. Just local trends coming into play I guess..

Now back on topic...

Weather is fairly windy as I said earlier with some drizzle starting.

Look, Karl. You can't censor other people by telling them they can't be 'emotional' in their posts. Sometime it feels like there is a certain way you want everyone to post and a certain line you want everyone to take and you get a bit narky when this is challenged. Weather and climate effects our lives, it has an effect on our environment and our lifestyle and I would hate to think everyone is expected to detach themselves from this aspect of the weather and post in a purely dry and scientific manner all the time.

BTW. Don't think the eastern suburbs won't dry off as well, it's not just the western suburbs and 'the west' that are in the firing line for climate change.

Not at all Andrew, I will ask questions of it and want to learn your feelings and thoughts on it. That is why I will be quite direct on here. It is not that I have an issue with anyone or anything your saying it's just where did you get that thought from and I want to understand.

I love the passion this forum produces but don't mistake it for personal attacks and such, It is a read forum where you cannot hear the person speaking so before making assumptions, read through it carefully and take the emotion out - that is what I have said from the start when constructing this place with Robyn.

You are all fabulous!! Great reporting this weekend guys, lots of fun!

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Bob I have tried to find what is happening but I may have to talk to Robyn (Rivergirl our wonderful site admin) about what is happening....

Drizzle stopped!! But it is getting much colder!!!

Re: Andrew I do get narky! Absolutely I do - because I am passionate and I don't always see it your way. I don't think I make people post a certain way or I would just delete them, people who are around me and who are moderators on this forum know that is not true about me. If you feel that way well I am sorry but look it is a non verbal form of communication and you cannot hear my inflections or speech behind it. But look I can only say post away. I like the way you post. It is opposite to me Thank GOD!

Oh and just to true to nature, nothing about me is scientific or dry so really that doesn't pertain to me or this forum:P

My long term forecasts have nothing to do with what or whats not happend last few days Karl hope you understand that mate, apart from about 4 or 5 posts I hardly posted in here yesterday and last night infact I haven't even said a word about this event or lack of it last night others have already covered it and theres no point in me dwelling on it either enough has been said about it. I too was left dissapointed with last night but hey S**t happends like was said many times it was a hit or miss thing so could of gone either way.

Anyway back on track lets hope for something next week hey be good to have something for my birthday and to everyone in here great job past few days awesome photos and stories of the storm chasing keep it up I guess with any community your always going to get few people who disagree but unlike the other mob I think we are alot better at handling ourselves if we don't see eye to eye on something and not let it get personal which is what I really like about this forum everyone moves on

With over 16,000 posts on this last weather event I think the forum is getting worn out Thanks to everyone for all your posts and photos, it's been awesome! I'm going into the control panel in my Admin role to have a look at what's happening there.

Karl and I sometimes don't see eye to eye on events or the future Andrew but to be quite frank and honest don't think hes the type to censor as has been said by him and I believe him. The forum has had a few problems probably due cos of the overload of posts but I know Karl very well and have met him and hes one of the more outgoing and easiest blokes to get along with and can't really see that being his style.

It was never the intent of Karl and myself to build a forum where people were banned or had their posts censored so I can vouch for Karl's honesty here. We've had a few problems with posts dropping off and I've been in the control panel trying to see what's happening. Sorry about this

Robyn (Rivergirl)

Wow, we've overloaded Karl and Robyn's forum... haha... that was the aim! Good to see so many reports etc... in here too these days!

Now on to the future, I still am getting the feeling that things will become unstable across parts of Victoria from about Sunday, persisting on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday at this stage. Things look to get unstable and moisture increases though these parts so things becoming quite humid again, and with a trough possibly going to move into the area along with quite hot surface temps, things look to get going again. We shall see though since its a while out, but keeping my eye on it. I heared Terry Ryan saying they cannot see much rain within the next 7-8 days but said there could be a trough about during the latter period, but its a wait and see thing atm.

Got up and opened the curtain a couple of times last night but saw only thin cloud under a bright moonlit sky. So we bummed out like most others and I can see how heaps here have got a dose of the grumps.

Today here has precipitated the start of the "drying out season" - very westerly windy and 26C, not good if we cant snare another humid chance in the next couple of weeks (like all others there's nothing "out in the offing" that I can see.