Roger Atkinson

Greetings all,
         Just a short comment (a parting shot?), inspired by Barry's msg, on "knock-em-downs". Up here in the centre of the universe (the Top End, for those dummies who thought differently), I understand the term has been inherited from the local aboriginal people, the Jawoyn, who use it to describe the season that follows the (monsoon) wet. i.e. the build-down, as
opposed to the build-up. I'm not contesting that the early buildup storms tend to be gusty (though they have no monopoly on the game, the same sort of vertical moisture/shear profile often occurs at the end of the wet), but the expression itself (it least in this neck of the woods) relates to the storms knocking down not trees, but spear grass. By the end of the wet, large tracts of the Top End are covered with mature spear grass (up to 3 metre tall). Navigating your way through it can be tricky and dangerous (you can see neither the snakes you're about to tread on, nor more generally where you're going), so the locals are much relieved when, at the end of the monsoon, the gusty storms come along and knock all the spear grass down. Hence the term. Now the question is, does the WA expression have it's own origin? Or did you fellows hear us using it and coin it? We would understand your reasons for copying much of what we say/do :) The earliest reference to the expression I could find in the extensive Tindal Met library is one by Ernestine Hill in "The Territory" (a ripping yarn if ever I've read one), published around 1950, if my memory serves me correctly (most unlikely).
         All yours....

Roger

P.S. While I'm at it, you WAian avmet fellows, why is it, do you suppose, that tropical thunderstorms that occur west of 129E only seem to be associated with visibility reductions down to around 3000m, and result in significant airfield weather deteriorations that last less than 30 minutes,  when those east of 129E often last close to an hour or even more, and
result in much more serious vis reductions (according to vismeter data)? Is it like that thingy about 'what is the sound of a tree falling in the forest'? .....oh, when you're located several thousand km southwards :)

John McBride

Ah.... Roger knows I can't resist the historical aspects of the Australian monsoon:  So, here, some quotes from Chapter VII of Ernestine Hill's 1951 book, "The Territory".  This chapter is an account of an expedition to settle Port Darwin via two ships of "settlers" from Adelaide, the ships being the Gulnare and the Bengal.  They sailed into Port Darwin together on 24th June 1870"  I shall quote verbatim, with a series of dots "......" when I omit sentences and/or paragraphs".  I hope you agree it is fascinating.

"New year came in with the north-west monsoon.  Rain was a thick curtain let down on the world.  Three inches in an hour, twelve inches in a day.  It rained with a helpless hysteria of weeping all through January, February and March, till the cliffs were waterfalls and the tracks running rivers.............And the green grass grew all round, sixteen feet high".
.................
"In April the wind changed -- "knockem-down rain" -- flattening the long grasses till you could see the next hut".......
....................
"In May the healthy trade-wind came rollicking in again, with its song of Pacific surf and cool, cloudless weather.

John McB