The drying up of hope

…The latest climate statement from the Bureau of Meteorology paints a picture of two rural Australias: the drought-ridden south and the well-watered north.

Bureau of Meteorology climate analysis head David Jones says the drought across southwest Western Australia, southeast South Australia, Victoria and northern Tasmania is longer and hotter than any before. “It is now very severe and without historical precedent.”


During the past 12 years, Victoria has essentially missed out on two years of rainfall, “which is an extraordinary result. Across Victoria as a whole, if you add up how much rainfall has been missed in 12 years, it is now up around 1300mm of rainfall, a very, very large rainfall deficit.”

He says recent years have been up to 2C warmer than the first half of last century, equivalent to moving Victoria about 400km closer to the equator.

Jones argues that “it is very difficult to make a case that this is just simply a run of bad luck driven by a natural cycle and that a return to more normal rainfall is inevitable”.

The Australian