Monday, 24th August 2009

Media Release

Summer days in winter break records in NSW

Northern parts of NSW have experienced extreme temperatures, with some records broken by more than 3ºC, says the Bureau of Meteorology. These high temperatures have occurred as part of an Australia wide event which has seen record high temperatures across every state and territory.

In northern NSW temperatures peaked on Sunday with 36.3ºC recorded at Mungindi Post Office. “This is the highest temperature recorded anywhere in NSW for August beating the previous record of 36.1ºC from Yamba in 1946”, said Ms Imielska of the NSW Bureau Regional Office.

More records will be broken with warm to hot conditions expected to persist till this evening, however, temperatures will gradually cool off over coming days.

“NSW experienced a record breaking heatwave during the past summer and this is now followed by record breaking temperatures in winter” added Ms Imielska.

The seasonal climate outlook for spring is forecasting above average daytime and night time temperatures across most of Australia with very high probabilities forecast for northern NSW. This is a result of recent warm conditions in the Indian Ocean as well as the warming in the Pacific.

Useful Links:

• Forecast for NSW districts
• Seasonal Climate Outlook
• Climate Averages

For further information contact:
Agata Imielska or Shannon Symons
NSW Climate Services Centre
(02) 9296 1546                     
climate.nsw@bom.gov.au