Australian Weather News -- February 2000

Australian Weather News

Go to the main news page	Find a place on a map	Monday 14 February 2000
Today's weather extremes		Flooding continues in the Centre Monsoonal activity continues across the nation's north Cold weather continues
Highest rainfall, 24 hours to 9am
117.4 Wycliffe Well Tanami NT 100.6 Winton PO Qld 96.0 Tewantin RSL Qld 92.6 Eumindi Qld		Flooding and impassably boggy roads continue to halt transport across a vast area of northern SA and southern NT as patchy heavy showers continue. In what the NT Department of Transport has described as the worst Central Australian floods since 1988, the main north/south Stuart Highway remains blocked by the flooded Finke and Palmer Rivers south of Alice Springs, both flowing about 2km wide. Hundreds of travellers have been forced to wait out the floods at tiny settlements and roadhouses, with 125 reported stranded at Erldunda Roadhouse, 200km south of the Alice. There are large build-ups of waiting traffic at Marla, Coober Pedy, Uluru and Alice Springs. Torrential rain associated with the monsoon trough again fell across southern NT and parts of Qld today. In the Territory, Tennant Creek Airport received 90mm in 3 hours to 6am, 70.4 of this falling in one hour to 5.30am. Shops in the town's main street were flooded when drainage failed to cope. Ali Curang, 150km south, reported 91mm in 12 hours to 9am, while nearby Wycliffe Well recorded 117.4 for the 24 hours to 9am. In western Qld, evening thunderstorms again produced some heavy falls, while early morning thunderstorms gave many gaugings of 20 to 50mm in SE Qld. Wintry daytime temperatures continue to be a feature, with maxima 10 to 15 below normal from central WA across the continent to SE Qld and down the NSW Great Divide. The cold was most intense in inland southern Queensland, where maximum thermometers read at 3pm gave Roma at top temperature of 17°, 17 below the February norm. Other low readings to 3pm were Surat 19, Cunnamulla 20 and Bollon 19, all 15 below. Because the official maximum temperature is recorded 9am to 9am, most of these unusually low recordings will not be entered in the record books, as it is likely the temperature will be higher by 9am tomorrow. The NSW Blue Mountains town of Katoomba also shivered yesterday and today as a fog and drizzle-laden southeasterly kept maxima close to the record low daytime temperature for February. The mercury only rose to 11.4 yesterday and 11.2 today. The lowest February maximum in the computer record which goes back to 1957 is 11.0 in 1966.
Highest & Lowest Temps
Maximum	Minimum
39.6 Gascoyne Jn WA 39.6 Eneabba PO WA	28.0 Barrow Is AP WA
11.0 Crackenback NSW	0.0 Crackenback NSW 0.0 Lake St Clair Tas
Greatest variations from normal
Maximum	Minimum
+8.8 32.2 Kingscote SA	+4.1 26.1 Hugnenden Qld
-14.5 20.2 Cunnamulla Qld -13.7 18.9 Mitchell Qld -13.5 19.7 Surat Qld	-10.2 7.0 Narrandera Council NSW -9.7 9.4 Arkaroola SA -7.7 8.5 Wagga AP NSW
Other extreme readings
Rainfall: Black Point NT: 63mm in 6hrs to 9pm Blackall Qld: 39mm in 6hrs to 9pm Camooweal Qld: 30mm in 1hr to 7.30pm Winton Qld: 51mm in 6hrs to 9pm Longreach Qld: 49mm in 3hrs to midnight, 35 falling after 11pm Tewantin Qld: 50mm in 6hrs to 6am
Records set this day
Arkaroola SA: Coldest February minimum temperature in 19 years record, 9.4 beating the previous record of 9.5

Times stated are the clock time in force in the relevant state or territory
Stories, including those in the archives, are as new and corrected information becomes available, with updates underlined
Australian Weather News gratefully acknowledges the Bureau of Meteorology as the collector and main source of meteorological data in Australia, along with the thousands of observers who record the weather and rainfall daily. I also thank Don White and the many contributors to the Aussie Weather mailing list who routinely provide much appreciated information.