|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
A History of Meteorology in
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
AcknowledgementsI wish to acknowledge Graeme Furler, the Regional Director of the South Australian Regional Office, for his support and inspiration in the undertaking and compilation of this History of Meteorology in South Australia. This work is part of South Australia's contribution towards the Centenary of Federation, and a tribute to the pioneering work of Sir Charles Todd. I am indebted to John Corbett for proof-reading the text and for helpful suggestions. The support of Alan Kernich (Manager, SA Climate Section) and fellow members of the SA Climate Section is also acknowledged and appreciated. I would like to thank Hank de Wit for additional typographical changes in the HTML version of this document. IntroductionSince the Dawn of Time, humans have had to live with their environment and adapt to the vagaries of the ever-changing weather and seasons. Australian Aborigines, during their long existence in the Australian continent, were the first to adapt to the South Australian climate. The arrival of Europeans necessitated the need to gather meteorological data for the setting up of a new society in an unknown environment. The meteorological pioneering work of Colonel William Light, Sir Charles Todd, George Goyder and others made a great contribution to the successful development of South Australia. Following Federation, the first Meteorology Act in 1906 established the Bureau of Meteorology that came into operation on January 1st, 1908. The Bureau has grown steadily to become one of the world's most effective climate and weather service providers. Australian AboriginesThe Australian Aborigines have, for the past 40,000 years or more, inhabited the continent of Australia. It seems that they entered the continent from the north, across the then land bridges, to settle as nomads in the vast Terra Australis. During their long existence before the advent of the Europeans, the Aborigines observed the seasonal cycles and lived in harmony with the land. Land tenure was simple and belonged to the tribe. Life was sustained, not by growing crops, but rather by hunting and gathering. Their movements in search of food and water were therefore tuned to the seasons. Their nomadic way of life provided them with a healthy diet and lifestyle. A deeply religious people, they both observed and revered nature, seeing great creatures and spirits everywhere, living and existing in their Dreamtime. An appreciation of the Australian Aborigines way of life can be found in the works of Blainey (1975) and Chatwin (1983) found in the bibliography. It is estimated that about 15,000 aborigines lived in South Australia at the time of white settlement (Kwan, p166). Their numbers however were somewhat reduced through many diseases, like smallpox, introduced into the country by the Europeans. When in 1837 Robert Cock and 3 companions explored the terrain from Adelaide to Lake Alexandrina, they observed enormous stringy barks, dingos and the presumed presence of the Kaurna people who wandered the forests between the hills and the coast in search of food. The Kaurna rapidly vanished after white settlement, the last of the full bloods died in the 1870's (Whitelock, p 20). European Explorers and PioneersThe Dutch were the first Europeans to record a venture along the South Australian coast. In the early days of the Dutch East India Company, ships captains plying eastwards along the roaring 40's, used the Southwest corner of Western Australia, which they called New Holland, as a landmark to veer northwards for Java along the west coast of Australia. In 1627 Francois Thijssen of the Gulden Zeepaard sailed 1000 miles east of Cape Leeuwin, to the presently named Denial Bay, where he found a group of islands, which he named Nuijts Archipelago, after Pieter Nuijts, a company official who was a passenger in his ship. He then turned back, unimpressed by the bareness of the land. The first official weather observations in the South Australian region were made in 1800 by Lieutenant James Grant of the Royal Navy. Grant in the Lady Nelson made his first landfall on December 3rd at a sandy headland that he named Cape Banks, just southeast of Robe. He then sailed along the coast naming Mount Gambier, Mount Shank and Cape Northumberland on his way eastwards to Sydney. The coastline between Denial Bay and Cape Banks was finally charted in 1802 by Captain Matthew Flinders (1774-1814) in the Investigator and by Captain Nicolas Baudin (1754-1803) of the French Navy in le Géographe. Operating from different positions, Flinders from Denial Bay and Baudin from the south, they met at Encounter Bay on April 8th and ignoring the fact that France and England were at war at that time, exchanged pleasantries and swapped maps of their respective discoveries. Baudin was to die of tuberculosis a year later on the island of Mauritius only a few weeks before Flinders himself arrived. Flinders was on his return trip to England with his maps, journals and books. He landed on Mauritias for repairs to his leaking ship, and was promptly interned by the French for six and a half years, until June 1810. This delayed the publication of Flinders own maps. The first map of the complete South Australian coastline was published in France in 1804. Incidentally, six weeks earlier than that historic encounter, Flinders lost eight men in a rowing cutter. The boat sank in a sudden squall [1] near Cape Catastrophe on February 22nd, 1802 and is the first known vessel to sink in South Australian waters. Flinders named the nearby Thistle Island after the ship's master and of the eight drowned. Earlier in 1798 Flinders, George Bass and John Thistle had sailed around Tasmania, proving it to be an island. Prior to the discoveries of Flinders and Baudin, British and American whalers were operating in SA waters from about 1790. The were soon joined by sealers from Sydney and Launceston. Kangaroo Island seemed to have had a small resident European male population from 1805-6. They procured aboriginal wives from the mainland (Parsons, p 4). Charles Sturt (1795-1869) and his team collected additional data during their epic boat-rowing journey down the Murray to Lake Alexandrina. Sturt discovery of the Murray River mouth in 1830 prompted the expedition of Capt Collett Barker in the following year. Operating from the Fleurieu Peninsula, Barker climbed Mount Lofty sighted the Port River and then tracked to the Coorong, where he was thought to have been speared by the Natives near the Murray River mouth, to the south of Hindmarsh Island. These early explorations prompted the further arrival of whalers and sealers in the decade prior to the establishment of the colony on December 28, 1836. Trading between Kangaroo Island and Tasmania can be dated from 1816. There are many interesting references to weather and climate in the ship's logs, journals and diaries of the early explorers. For example, Flinders commented on the fine harbour at Port Lincoln but noted that the surrounding country was dry. He pointed out that the eastern shore of Gulf St Vincent was much better country. Sturt, on his boat journey down the river Murray, made similar comments on the southern Mount Lofty Ranges. This lead Colonel Robert Torrens (1780-1864) [2], the head of the South Australian Colonisation Commission, to correctly surmise that the presence of ranges and westerly winds meant that this was a higher rainfall zone. All these early explorations prompted the further arrival of whalers, and sealers, in the decade prior to the establishment of the colony on December 28, 1836. In fact, trading between Kangaroo Island and Tasmania can be dated from 1816. In 1831, the Griffiths family of Launceston, formerly of Sydney, appointed the 22-year-old Englishman John Hart (1809-1873) as captain to their new schooner Elizabeth that plied the Kangaroo Island trade. Hart's employment made him acquainted with parts of the SA coast, and while in England in 1835, for the purpose of buying a new ship for his employers, he gave useful information about South Australia to the Colonisation Commission (Parsons p 8). Presumably, Hart also gave sailing information to Colonel Light. In time, Hart settled at Port Adelaide where he founded a large flourmill. He became a leading politician and one of the early premiers of South Australia. Observations by Colonel William LightColonel William Light (1786-1839), Fig. 1, in command of the 162 tons barque Rapid landed at Nepean Bay on August 20th 1836. He had left England on May 4th, 1836. His deputy, George Strickland Kingston and the ten staff members of the survey team left London in the Cygnet on March 24th 1836 and reached Nepean Bay on Sunday, September 11th 1836.
Light made extensive naval and land explorations around Kangaroo Island, Encounter Bay and the Gulf areas of South Australia. See Map of Light's Maritime explorations (P31 of Elder).
Light kept detailed records of his activities and these included many informative weather observations. Here is an example of a squall that he experienced while anchored at Rapid Bay:- October 12, 1836: Light airs from the east and very fine weather ... and the idea of winter and gales being now over ... At eight, we began sending things on shore; at ten the wind shifted to the NNW and WNW, at noon a sudden change of wind to the NNE with sultry and oppressive air; in a few minutes, thunder clouds appeared very near, from the westward; without any previous indications a sudden breeze from the westward sprang up, and a high sea ... At half past one pm several severe flashes of lightning with thunder close to us, and the rain fell heavy; about two, this squall passed over but we found ourselves in now another gale ... hard gales and a high sea throughout the night. October 13, 1836: Strong gales and a high sea. All the forenoon the ship pitched very much, but she held on well; at one pm it began to moderate, and by four we had fine weather ... we landed a few more things the same evening. Light chose Adelaide because of his knowledge of the Mediterranean climate. He was aware of the likelihood of dry summers and believed that the Mount Lofty Ranges would help to bring rain to the area (Elder, p 29). Governor Hindmarsh challenged his choice of the site, for he preferred the Capital to be at Victor Harbor. Others preferred Port Lincoln. Throughout his administration, Hindmarsh was a hindrance to Light, and there were serious delays in land surveying and consequently in the growth of primary industry. Most of Light's journals, diaries, letters, sketches and paintings were unfortunately lost in January 1839, when his surveyors hut near the corner of West Terrace and North Terrace was accidentally burned down. They no doubt would have contained considerable weather information for the 1837-38 period. Soon afterwards, Light's health deteriorated and he died of tuberculosis in October 5, 1839, aged 53. Following the demise of Light, meteorological observations were continued by Kingston [3] , later Sir George Strickland Kingston (Fig. 3), who took daily weather observations until 1879 at his town acre block at the corner of West Terrace and Grote Street. Mr William Wyatt, JP, who was at one time coroner of the colony and a protector of Aborigines, took temperature readings presumably at his Grenfell Street residence for the period 1838 to 1843. The maximum temperature in Adelaide during 1838 was 101;1839, 106;1840 103; 1841,102; 1842, 106; and 1843, 105. (Hunt, p188). Kingston and Wyatt co-operated with WJ Power, who incorporated the relevant temperature and rainfall data in his "Climate of South Australia" article in the 1842 Royal South Australian Almanac (Gentili, p 64).
Meteorological observations were made at the Survey Office for a number of years, until the arrival of Charles Todd in November 1856 (Todd, 1894, p 3.). Also Gentili (p64) states "at the Surveyor- General's Office temperature, observations were made at 10,12, 14 and 16 hours from April 1844 to March 1845". Some meteorological observations were invariably made during the inland explorations of Edward John Eyre (1815-1901) in 1839-1841, Charles Sturt 1844-46 and John McDouall Stuart (1815-1866) 1860-62 for the purpose of finding fertile land suitable for agriculture or minerals. The South Australia government sponsored all these expeditions. Only the Stuart expedition was deemed successful. Stuart returned to Adelaide on December 17, 1862 and gave the government a favourable report on the weather and terrain he had recently traversed. As a consequence, the South Australian government acquired the administration of the Northern Territory from London. The South Australian government continued to administer the Territory for 48 years till 1913, when the Commonwealth took over on payment of £3,431,000 for debts incurred for the development of the Territory (Scott, p 242-244). John Forrest (1847-1918) explored the arid NW of SA west of the Overland Telegraph line in 1874. Rural Growth and Social Conditions in South Australia to 1890Weather elements affect all agricultural pursuits and particularly so in the case of South Australia where wheat farming played a major role in the successful growth of the colony. The settlement of South Australia commenced in 1836 and the Adelaide city plan was laid out in 1837. Agriculture was under way by 1842 (Kernick, 1998 p1) and it was not until the 1840's when the plains near Adelaide were opened up for wheat that Australia had enough grains to feed herself (Blainey 1974 p119). This of course was largely due to the lack of an interior waterway system that would have given Sydney, on the east coast of the continent, access to the plains west of the Great Australian Divide. By this time, the income from wheat exports soon overcame the proceeds from whaling, which had been South Australia's first profitable export industry. The abolition of the Corn Laws in 1846, further helped South Australia by opening the British market to Australian wheat, while the repeal of the Navigation Act - three years later - resulted in better-built, more efficient, ships from America at cheaper freight rates. The efficient transport of wheat by train to the colony's ports from 1860's onwards soon replaced the cumbersome bullock teams and the installation of the telegraph facilitated communication in trade, the spread of news, social events, collection of weather data and the issue of warnings. The northward expansion of the SA wheat lands during the 1860 to 1890 is superbly outlined in the excellent work of D W Meinig (1963). Wheat farmers and the business of servicing agriculturalists relied heavily on weather, particularly with regard to rainfall so it soon become mandatory to collect and maintain detailed weather records. These were commercially begun by Kingston in Adelaide in 1839 - the first in Australia and were systematically implemented after the arrival in Adelaide in November 1855 of the first Government Astronomer and Telegrapher Charles Todd (1826-1910). Wheat exports was further helped by the expansion of railways and the telegraph - first built in Australia in 1856. These provided for rapid transport and a quick method of communicating. Responsible government was achieved in 1856, having been made possible by the 1850 Australian Colonies Government Act. At the time the South Australian population had reached 100,000. During the gold rush years, the acreage sown to wheat continued to expand in South Australia but fell in the eastern states. To their credit South Australian farmers kept to the land and wheat exports continued to grow. About this time, steamboats began to ply up and down the Murray attracting merchandise from inland areas of Victoria and New South Wales. River trade grew steadily during the next three decades with Goolwa becoming its chief port. Proceeds from wheat exports continued to assist the immigration process and the population continued to grow. It reached 185,626 in 1871 and ten years later in 1881 increased further to 279,865. (Kelly p20). By the early 1880's, Adelaide had a population of 40,000 "or around 60,000 within a ten-mile radius from the post office. Many are Germans, most esteemed colonists; Chinese are also numerous." Wragge (1885, p 16) Despite the years of drought in the early 1880's, the acreage sown to wheat in SA reached a record level of 1,942,453 acres out of 3,358,952 for the whole of Australia in 1884, making SA the wheat basket of the nation (Kelly p 22-23). The wheat acreage, however, gradually fell away as nearly all of the 1880's suffered from recurring droughts, particularly in the north, where 600,000 acres were surrendered. A more detailed account of the rural growth in South Australia can be found in the works of Meinig (1963) and Mincham (1964) listed in the bibliography. Coping with the Vagaries of the Weather During the Early Colonial Days.From the very beginning of the colony, the summer heat was a great concern to the new settlers, and heat exhaustion was common. On the inaugural Proclamation Day, on December 28, 1836, the shade temperature had allegedly been over 100°F (40°C) for 4 consecutive days (Corbett, 2002). The hot summer of 1850-51 caused a severe water shortage that badly disrupted the shipment of wheat and copper ore. Also many valuable animals were lost (Kelly, p12). The drought continued until the end of April when 33 mm (1.5 inches) of rain fell in Adelaide. This was followed by 163mm (6.5 inches) in May and by the beginning of spring, Adelaide had recorded 20 inches since the break of the drought in April. The rain was heavier in the hills and to the south of Adelaide, resulting in flooded creeks and boggy roads. To add to the misery of the weather, unemployment also was running high at the time and many left SA for the Victorian goldfields. Heavy rains in October 1853, caused local flooding in the Barossa Valley and the village of Hoffnengthal had to be abandoned after being settled 6 years before in 1847 by 20 German migrant families. Floods and local inundations were common in the hills and along the low laying coastal areas such as Port Adelaide and Port Noarlunga. Coastal gales and storms caused havoc to shipping and there were numerous shipwrecks. The drought of the mid 1860's was followed by a wet and warm spring in 1867 that caused a severe attack of red rust on the wheat harvest of 1867-68. Rust, droughts, the loss of soil fertility and the onset of locusts were common problems for the early farmers. Goyder's Line of RainfallThe early settlers experienced good growing seasons but the long hot dry summers were a concern to all. The opening up of land for agriculture was a government control operation in which the proceeds of land sale were used to subsidise emigration. The pace of expansion was to keep pace with the availability of land, which was parcelled out, in contiguous blocks. By the early 1860's most of the good farming land had already been sold and the government was under pressure to open up the vast more arid lands further north towards the Flinders Ranges. As nothing was known at the time of the rainfall pattern in these drier regions, the Surveyor General George Woodroffe Goyder (1826-1898 - Fig. 4) was given the task of assessing the feasibility of this northwards expansion. Late in 1865, at the height of a severe drought, Goyder made several trips to the north of the state, making notes as to the type of vegetation and condition of the soils. He finally defined a line on a map - see Fig. 5, to the south of which rainfall was deemed to be reliable enough for all sorts of agricultural pursuits but the lands to the north of the line were suitable only for grazing. As no detailed rainfall records were then available on which to base his observations, this was indeed a bold prediction. With more than a century of rainfall data, Goyder Line has proved a very accurate comment on the rainfall of SA. Goyder himself was a man of great energy and unimpeachable character. He "was a small man, not much more than 1.5 m in height, with red hair and a pallid complexion" (Colls and Whitaker, p25). He came to South Australia in 1851 and in January 1853 was appointed to the Colonial Engineers Office where in 1861, Goyder was promoted to Surveyor General. As Surveyor General, Goyder was responsible for the planning of Darwin as well as many SA townships in the Mid North. He married Frances Smith in 1851. She died in 1870 living him with nine children. About 18 months later in November 1871 he then married Frances's sister Ellen who outlived him with another son and twin daughters. During the weather benign years of the early 1870's the population in South Australia rose rapidly with a corresponding increase in the demand for land. Pressure was put on the government to push rural development beyond the Goyder Line. The Government eventually succumbed to the pressure, allowing farming allotments to extend all the way to the northern border of the colony. For the next few years, the farming of virgin soils and good rains resulted in bumper crops from the "Golden North". Farmers alleged that Goyder had forgotten the old European maxim that "rain follows the plough". It was believed that by breaking the soil, more moisture was released into the air and this then became available for rainmaking.
Wheat growing became general in the districts around Port Augusta in 1877 and 1878. Good harvests continued in 1879 and 1880 but a severe drought came in 1881 and continued in 1882. Protracted drought during the early 1880's forced many farmers into ruin and many northern settlements had to be abandoned. The Adelaide Observatory and the work of Sir Charles Todd (1826 - 1910)On February 10, 1855 the colonial government of SA appointed the Londoner Charles Todd (Fig. 6) to the dual post of Superintendent of Telegraphs and Government Astronomer. He was to set up, direct, and supply weather services to South Australians for the next half a century to 1906, when he retired. Todd was a leading exponent of the science of Meteorology in Australia (Gentili, p69). When he arrived in South Australia on November 4, 1855 Todd immediately commenced meteorological observations, initially at his private house in North Adelaide, then at Government House grounds and finally on completion in 1860 of the Adelaide Observatory at West Terrace. (Corbett et al, 1970). The Observatory was some 400 metres north of the Kingston site at the corner of Grote and West Terrace. Todd, as an astronomer and electrical engineer, was an enthusiast of the telegraph which had been invented by Samuel Morse in the late 1830's. Todd was a visionary and he would assert that the telegraph was "to the meteorologist what the telescope is to the astronomer" (Todd, 1894, p 7). Recognising that the telegraph provided a quick means for gathering weather observations, that could systematically be used to get a broad synoptic view of the prevailing weather over a considerable area, Todd, in 1856 submitted a meteorological plan to the government.
The plan depended on a network of observations that was required to daily report by telegraph to the central observatory. Growth was slow at first, but as the telegraph network expended, so did his weather-reporting network. The expansion got a greater impetus in 1870 when Todd was made also Post Master General and all post offices came under his control. As Post Master General, Todd set about to construct the famous Adelaide to Darwin overland telegraph linking Australia with Europe through Batavia (now Djakarta). This building of a nation project was completed in November 1872. The project had taken 18 months to complete. It covered a distance of 3,200Km along 36,000 poles through much of the land that had been explored by Macdouall Stuart (1816-1866) in the second half of 1862. In 1877, Todd extended the Telegraph from Port Augusta to Eucla on the WA border that had been extended from 132E to 129E. in 1861. Todd trained his own observers and interested volunteers. He instructed his Post Office staff to take regular daily observations and to post them to the Adelaide Observatory. He systematically collected information from South Australia and the Northern Territory, and arranged for the interchange of data from other Australian colonies and New Zealand, which had all embraced his meteorological system. When Todd addressed the 5th conference of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science, held in Adelaide in September 1893, he claimed that there were (at that time) 21 meteorological stations throughout SA and the Northern Territory and 370 rain-gauging stations. The Australian and New Zealand network had a total of 357 stations with 2,575 rain-reporting sites. (Todd 1894, pp 3-7). Todd pioneered the publication of weather maps in newspapers. These were regularly published in the local and interstate newspapers from 1882 onwards. His forecasting method consisted of writing out each forecast independently of his assistant, Richard Fletcher Griffiths. The two gentlemen would then compare notes, and following a reasoned discussion, would publish the result. Todd verified his forecast, and at the 1893 Adelaide conference, he was able to claim that his daily forecasts were accurate on 73% of occasions over the previous 4 years; partly correct on 20% of occasions and wholly wrong on 7% of occassions (Todd, 1894, p22). Another of Todd assistants, was the Adelaide born William Ernest Cooke, (1863 - 1947). Cooke joined the Adelaide Observatory on completion of a BA from the Adelaide University in 1883. He stayed until 1896 when he transferred to Perth. On Todd's recommendation, he became Western Australia's first Government Astronomer-Meteorologist. In 1912 Cooke became both Government Astronomer of New South Wales, and Professor of Astronomy, at the University of Sydney. He retained these positions until the 1930s. Todd also published journals, presented papers to scientific organizations, and submitted annual reports to the State Government. He held leading positions in a number of learned societies, and educational and public institutions. He was always ready to assist and advise. He was a foundation member, and inaugural president, of the Astronomical Society of South Australia (founded on May 18th 1892) and continued to be the elected president until his death in 1910 (ASSA, 2002) At the time of Todd's retirement, in 1906 (Gibbs, 1999 p 22), there were 510 rainfall stations in South Australia and the Northern Territory, 22 of which were fully equipped for all meteorological observations. The fully equipped stations furnishing daily reports to the Adelaide Observatory were (CSA, p398):
Todd was noted for his quips. For example, as head of the Posts and Telegraphs Department, he was once asked whether a postal service could be provided at Orrorroo. Todd replied that it would not be worthwhile, as there were only two letters in Orrorroo (ASSA, 2002). Todd being a teetotaller, would occasionally quip "I'd be Odd without my T" (Aust Dict of Biography p 282). In his later years, Todd ruled his departments as a benevolent autocrat, trusted by both his employers and employees. He proved to be a great asset towards the growth of Meteorology in Australia, and particularly to the expanding colony of South Australia. He was so highly regarded that the SA Parliament deliberately delayed compulsory retirement laws at age 65 until the esteemed octogenarian retired of his own choice. Clement Wragge in South AustraliaOne of Australia most colourful eccentrics, the meteorologist Clement Wragge (1852-1922, Fig. 7), was born in England, and in his late teens arrived in NSW. Of a restless nature he migrated to the United States in 1874 and two years later in 1876 returned to Australia and was appointed to the South Australian Survey-General Department where he presumably had some association with Todd. While in South Australia, Wragge visited many inland centres, where noting the bareness of the land, he suggested that the waters of the east coast rivers be diverted over the ranges, to collect in a great inland sea in Central Australia. Wragge had pre-empted the Snowy Mountains Scheme. When no politician would listen to his scheme he returned to England in 1878, and devoting himself to meteorology, he set up the Ben Nevis Observatory in 1881 to study the variations of weather with altitude. In England he married and later returned to Australia, landing at Port Adelaide on December 6th 1883. He rented a two-storey house near the banks of the Torrens at Walkeroot (now Walkerville) and soon after set up an observatory on Mount Lofty with readings from January 1st, 1884. About this time he wrote an account of some of his work in Adelaide (Wragge, 1885). After some time in Tasmania, where he reorganised the Tasmanian meteorological network, he was in 1887 appointed Government Meteorologist for Queensland (to 1903) and moved to Brisbane.
A man of great enthusiasm and energy, he established an observation network for Queensland, New Guinea, New Caledonia and Norfolk Island. He was one of the first meteorologists to name cyclones. At first he used names from the Greek and Roman myths and then female names. Finally he used names of politicians. Wragge was pre-eminent in the argument for the setting up of an Australia wide meteorological service. In 1907, after the states had agreed that Meteorology was a Federal issue, the Commonwealth Government advertised for the position of Commonwealth meteorologist. Wragge was a confident applicant. When his application was rejected he turned public lecturer, touring Australia and the world, giving popular lectures on science (Gibbs, 1998, p14-18). In 1910 he settled in NZ where in 1922, he died a pauper aged 70 a few weeks after collapsing at a public lecture. Despite his eccentric character, his contribution to the development of Australasian Meteorology was considerable, particularly in the field of orography and tropical meteorology. He pioneered long range forecasting, and one of his assistants was the popular Inigo Jones (1872-1954)[5] who founded the Crohamhurst Observatory in Queensland. On February 2, 1893 he measured 35.71 inches (907mm) of rain at Crohamhurst; the greatest daily fall on record in Australia (Hogan, p13). Federation and the Birth of the Commonwealth Bureau of MeteorologyPrior to the advent of Federation, each of the colonies had their own meteorological office. At the time, all colonial meteorologists had additional functions other than observing the weather. In fact, most served, as Government Astronomers and Todd was in addition Post Master General for South Australia. Realizing that the weather recognises no political boundaries, colonial meteorologists pre-empted Federation by fostering uniformity of codes, observation practices, and standards. Telegraphy at the time determined how quickly and how much information could be disseminated. Users of weather forecasts could get their products from newspapers, bulletins attached to prominent places and signals from flags and lanterns. The primary goal of forecasting service was to reduce the number of shipwrecks. One hundred vessels sank off the British coast in a single week in 1881 and over 600 drowned in another week that same year (Friedman, p3) To achieve uniformity, an inaugural congress of all colonial meteorologists was held in Sydney in 1879 at which the standards of the International Meteorological Committee (founded in 1873) were adopted. The Sydney congress was followed by two other congresses held in Melbourne in 1881 and 1888. Todd eminently gave a lucid summary of the status of meteorology in Australia and New Zealand in his 1893 address in Adelaide to the 5th meeting of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science (Todd 1894). Australian meteorologists were also pre-eminent overseas. Todd attended the 1885 International Telegraphic Conference in Berlin while both Clement Wragge and Georg von Neumayer (1826-1908) attended the 1891 Munich International Meteorological Congress in Germany. The latter had been Government Astronomer for Victoria from 1859 to 1863 when he returned to Germany where from 1874 till his retirement in 1903 was head of the German Naval Observatory (Gibbs, 1998 p 12). Following the advent of Federation (January 1, 1901), meteorology became the responsibility of the Commonwealth (Meteorology Act) and the Commonwealth Bureau of Meteorology was created as a part of the Department of the Interior in 1907. It was at this time that meteorology in Australia formally separated from astronomy. Wragge had argued for years for a Federal Bureau of Meteorology, separate of astronomical duties. (Gibbs, 1998 p 18) Henry Ambrose Hunt (1866-1946), who emigrated from England in 1884, was appointed first Commonwealth Meteorologist in 1907. After visiting the various colonial meteorological offices, he wrote a report on the state of Meteorology in each of the regions. Reporting on South Australia Hunt made a note of the annual salaries and the names of the staff members at the Adelaide Observatory. These were R. F. Griffiths (OIC), £330; G. F. Dodwell, £150; S. W. Chettle, £140; E. Bromley, £120; G. Gray £120 and J. Kelly £102 (Hunt, 1907). Presumably the latter was the gardener earlier mentioned by Shinkfield (1970). Incidentally, Hunt also noted that the recently retired Sir Charles Todd was on a salary of £500. Work at the Commonwealth Bureau of Meteorology commenced on January 1, 1908 with its Head Office in Melbourne. Initially, the Bureau had a permanent staff of 30 Australia wide with 2 positions vacant. By 1919 the permanent staff had grown to 71 and the rest of the public service, excluding the PMG personnel, totalled 3980. Some staff members on the 1919 list rose to dizzy heights. These included (after Linforth, 1998)
Meteorology in South Australia Since FederationTodd retired on December 31, 1906 (Todd, 1907)[6] and was followed by his much-esteemed assistant Richard Fletcher Griffiths as acting Government Astronomer and Meteorologist. Griffiths continued in this position until December 1907, when he transferred to head office where he assisted Hunt in the compilation of the forecasts transmitted to the various states. He maintained this until his retirement in 1925 (Hogan, 1986). In South Australia, George Frederick Dodwell (1879-1963) replaced him until April 1909. Both Griffiths and Dodwell were SA Government appointees. Dodwell was English born and joined the Adelaide Observatory as an Assistant Astronomer in 1899. He gained a BA from the University of Adelaide in 1905. With the establishment of the Commonwealth Bureau of Meteorology in 1908 and the subsequent separation of duties of astronomer and meteorologist, Dodwell elected to retain his State Government Astronomer appointment - a position that he continued to hold until his retirement in 1952. Dowell's decision to remain astronomer paved the way for Edward (Ward) Bromley (1882-1952, Fig. 8) appointment in 1909 as State Meteorologist (now Regional Director SA). Bromley, who had joined the service in 1906 and in his youth, had briefly worked with Todd. Bromley was to head the South Australian office for the next 38 years until his retirement in August 1947.
In the early 1920's the total Bureau staff in South Australia consisted of the State Meteorologist (Mr Bromley), his assistant Bern Newman, 3 clerks and a messenger; a total complement of six. In addition there was a gardener-handyman (Mr Kelly) and a cleaning lady (Miss Ella Lynch). The latter was trained to move nothing but the dust and dirt. The work practices at the time probably had changed little from those set up under Todd in the 1890's. The staff operated from two offices - one at the GPO and the other at the West Terrace Observatory. At the PMG, Bureau staff worked in a small room (5m x 3.4m) which in order to facilitate the passages of hand messages had an opening to the main telegraphic room, which was occupied by the large PMG staff. It was not the ideal workplace for it was draughty and noisy. At certain times of the day, as for instance at 12 noon, the noise level was deafening as in order to synchronise time across SA and the Northern Territory clerks would all simultaneously hit their Morse keys to announce the time check. At the PMG, clerks collated the data and produced a 9am and 3pm bulletin. At 10:30am, Mr Bromley or his deputy would walk from West terrace to the PMG in order to verify the forecasts that were daily made in the central office in Melbourne [7] and issued to the SA Meteorologist by telegram. These forecasts were to be used unaltered except when conditions warranted and after consultation with Head Office. While at the PMG, the State Meteorologist would also prepare press charts and weather notes and if necessary give press interviews. Having finished at the PMG around 12:45, Bromley would then walk back to West Terrace (Shinkfield, p3-6). Visual upper wind observations using small hydrogen filled balloons observed through a theodolite, began at West Terrace on February 7th, 1925 - see Fig 9, and continued there until transferred, first to the State's then main Airport at Parafield in 1937, and later to West Beach, after the opening of Adelaide Airport in 1955. At that time, however, Parafield Airport was the State's main airport. Aviation meteorological briefings began at Parafield Airport [8] on completion of the first Weather Officer course in 1937. Reg Shinkfield, Ray Wyatt and J. D. S. Hutchinson all were South Australian attendees of the course. An interstate participant, Vance Deering, later worked at Adelaide Airport in the late 1960's and early 1970's. Course instructors included E. Timcke and John Hogan (not "Doc"). Shinkfield returned to open the Parafield Meteorological Station in September of 1937 - Fig. 9 (Shinkfield, p 7). In 1955, on completion of the new Adelaide Airport, the Aviation Meteorological Office was transferred to West Beach. It remained there until 1974, when it was transferred to the SA Regional Office at Kent Town.
Radiosonde observations in South Australia commenced in 1942 and by 1945 radar measurements of wind strength and directions were being made.
Bureau staff continued to occupy a part of the old Observatory till 1940 when they moved to an adjacent site on West Terrace on the corner of Glover Avenue (see Fig. 10). This new site soon boasted a teleprinter- a vast improvement in communications. During WWII, the Bureau gave worthy service to the armed forces and many officers joined for service with the RAAF. During the war years, Bromley became a Squadron Leader in the R.A.A.F., and teleprinters were introduced into the Adelaide office to speed communications. When Bromley retired in 1947, after 39 years of service, George William Mackey (1906-1979) succeeded him. At the time the Adelaide office was staffed 17 hours a day from 4am to 9pm. Mackey, originally from Western Australia, was with the Royal Australian Naval College, Jervis Bay from 1920 to 1922 and joined the Bureau in 1927 as a meteorological assistant. Three years later he joined the Postmaster-General's Department as a Cadet Engineer but rejoined the Bureau as Assistant Meteorologist (Research), in 1936. He was Meteorologist in Charge at Darwin from 1937 to 1940. During the war he at first joined the Royal Australian Naval Reserve, but later transferred to the R.A.A.F. and served as Squadron Leader in Malaya, Sumatra and Darwin. After the war, he was Regional Director (Deputy Director) for Tasmania (1945-1947). He become Regional Director for South Australia until his transfer to Western Australia in 1948 where he was the Regional Director until his retirement on Feb 26, 1971 (Weather News, 1971). In 1969, Mackey received an MBE for services to Meteorology. Henry Evans Banfield (1887-1974) followed Mackey in 1948, until his retirement in 1952. Born in Bega, NSW, Banfield was in the AIF in the First World War and served in Egypt, Gallipoli, Sinai and France. Winning a commission in 1916, he was later awarded the Military Cross for outstanding bravery in September 1918 (Gibbs, 1999 p 23). Banfield joined the Sydney office in 1919 and transferred to Adelaide in 1939. He served in the R.A.A.F. Meteorological Service during the Second World War and was Regional Director for Tasmania before taking over the position of Regional director for South Australia, 1948-1952. He retired in 1952. Extensions to the 1940 Bureau building were added in 1962-63, under the direction of John ("Doc") Hogan (1912-1978) who in 1953 had succeeded Banfield as regional director. Hogan [9] joined the Bureau in 1937 after having spent 5 years in the Carnegie Observatory in Western Australia, which he had joined after graduation as a B Sc in 1931. After spending some months in Perth and Melbourne offices, he was posted to Port Moresby to organise a meteorological reporting network for Papua and New Guinea. He served in the Melbourne and Perth offices from 1940 to 1953, holding a commissioned rank with the RAAF from 1941 to 1946. He was SA regional Director from 1953 until his retirement in 1972. He was nicknamed "Doc" from his school days for "his efforts to treat the injuries of his schoolmates" (Gibbs, 1986, p1). In 1971, after calling a public meeting, Doc Hogan organized a steering committee, which established the Australian Meteorological Association (AMetA) The West Terrace site was too small for the increase demands for met services in the late 1960's and the corresponding increase in staff. In order to alleviate the problem, the Special Services unit - at the time being managed by Angus Robin - was temporarily located to the FCA House, in Franklin Street. It was later moved to City Cross, and later still to Western Offices in Currie St, which already housed the Forecasting and Warning Section and the Information Section. In 1966 reception of orbital weather satellite data began and by late 1960's satellite images were being sent by NEFAX from HO to the Adelaide Office. In 1977, the same year that the South Australian Regional Office moved from West Terrace to the new premises at College Rd Kent Town, Japan's Geostationary Meteorological Satellite was launched, and pictures were received every 3 hours. The site for the present SA Regional Office building at Kent Town (Fig. 11, was chosen by Regional Director, Allan Thomas Brunt (1920-), who had succeeded Hogan in 1972. Brunt, originally from Queensland joined the Bureau in 1938. He had served in the R.A.A.F. Meteorolgical Unit with service at East Sale, in Queensland, and in New Guinea. During the Second World War he was Officer in Charge of No. 3 Mobile Meteorological Flight, attached to the 6th Australian Army Division, operating in north-west New Guinea. (AMetA 1997) Late in 1973, during the directorship of Brunt, the Regional Forecasting Centre (RFC) was established. The RFC concept was to consolidate, into one section, the operations of both the Public Weather meteorologists at the Adelaide Regional Office and Aviation Forecasters at Adelaide Airport. The integration of all services, however, had to wait until 1977 when the new Bureau building in Kent Town was completed. The whole SA Regional Office, which was previously situated at both West Terrace and at the Western Offices in Currie Street, then moved into the new Kent Town premises. While Forecasters were removed from the airports, Meteorological Briefing Officers were retained at the Adelaide and Parafield airports, and at the Edinburgh R.A.A.F. base until the late 1990's. Brunt retired in 1980 - see Weather News (1980) - after 38 years of service in the Bureau, and was succeeded by Lynn Mitchell (1927-). Mitchell, affectionately known as "Mitch", was born in WA and moved to Adelaide in 1949 on completion of his meteorologist training course. He spent most of his 31 years of service with the Bureau in Adelaide. He became Senior Meteorologist in charge of the Forecasting and Warning Section in 1960, Officer in Charge of Special Services Section in 1963, and Supervising Meteorologist in 1970. In 1965 he established the Bureau's ACT Regional Office (Weather News, 1984). When he retired in 1984, he was succeeded by the current Regional Director, Graeme W. Furler (1941-). Increased demands for specialised and other quality services during the 1980's led to computerisation in the Regional Office. The Automated Regional Operations System (AROS) was installed in 1989 based on a Tandem CLX640 fault-tolerant system. Increasing computerisation, demands for high speed graphics, and internetworking lead to it's replacement in 1999. The new Australian Integrated Forecasting System (AIFS) is based on a dual IBM J50/RS6000 clustered system. AIFS currently provides the main technical support tools for the provision of weather forecasts and warnings. During the 1990's rationalisation of services and the establishment of Automatic Weather Stations has led to the closure of met briefing operations at Adelaide Airport (1996), Parafield (1998) and Edinburgh (1999). In line with Federal Government policy the Kent Town building was sold by auction to a private concern in August 1998 and leased back from the new owner on a 10 year contract.
The Adelaide Observatory (Fig. 12) was demolished in 1951 and the site used for new buildings for the Adelaide Boys High School. Nearly 30 years later, the nearby Commonwealth Building was also demolished, and the site reverted in part to parkland, the remainder used for road widening.
Regional Directors for South Australia.Colonel William Light, as Surveyor General, made meteorological observations from 1836 - 1839. His work was continued by his immediate successor George Strickland Kingston who from 1839 commenced rain gauge recordings at his town residence at the corner of Grote St and West Terrace; he continued to do so till 1879. From about 1840 and prior to the arrival in Adelaide in November 1855 of the first SA Government Astronomer and Telegrapher, Charles Todd (later Sir)- the South Australian Survey Department made some meteorological observations under the guidance of the Surveyor General.
Gathering of Meteorological Data at West TerraceThree sites are associated with the Adelaide - West Terrace (observation station number 023000) and these were all within 400 metres of each other (Burrows, 1999). The sites are:
The formal closure in 1979 of West Terrace, ended 140 years of records in that area; this is one of the longest continuous records of observations in the Southern Hemisphere. Kingston's rainfall recordings form the basis of the rainfall statistics for Adelaide - West Terrace. A comparison analysis of the rainfall readings for the data collected from the two nearby sites - i.e. the Observatory and Kingston Town Acre for the period 1860-1879 showed that the mean annual difference for these two sites was only 6.5mm, with Kingston's figures being the greater (Corbett et al, 1970). Air temperature observations for Adelaide began in November 1856 at Todd's residence in North Adelaide at first and later from within the grounds of Government House (North Terrace). Observations at West Terrace began in 1860 on completion of the Adelaide Observatory. Instruments were transferred there from Government House on May 8th to 10th .
At the Observatory, initially thermometers were exposed in a Greenwich stand. Additional readings were also taken from thermometers exposed in a nearby Octagon Hut (Fig. 15) that had been purpose built to Todd's specifications. For some years sling thermometer readings were also taken and compared with readings taken from the Hut and the Greenwich stand (Todd, 1891 p XI, XII). As a result of controversy about exposure methods, Stevenson Screen temperatures began to be read from January 1887. For comparison purposes for many years, concurrent readings for the three types of exposures were taken. The following temperature records were taken - dry bulb, wet bulb, plus maximum and minimum for dry and wet bulb. Readings of Greenwich stand temperatures are available for all years of record to 1947. Greenwich stand observations continued at the Observatory until December 31st, 1943 when the stand was moved to the adjoining Bureau site at the corner of West Terrace and Glover Avenue, some 40 metres north of the Observatory. The Greenwich stand continued at the Bureau site until August 1, 1947 when Stevenson Screen temperatures become official.
West Terrace site has one of the longest continuous series of observations in Australia. These are:
Also worth noting is that ozone concentration was regularly observed between 1870-1910 or thereabouts using Schonbein's test paper method (Millard, R). The test paper was obtained by dipping a strip of bibulous paper into a solution of starch and sodium iodide. After drying, the litmus was exposed to the elements for 12 hours. The amount of discolouring, apparently, gave an indicator of the concentration of the ozone in the atmosphere. The method for the preparation of the solution, the subsequent exposure and the proper analysis of the litmus paper is outline in Buchan (p 188-190). Sea temperature measurements were also made at the Port Adelaide lighthouse near the entrance of the Port River. These readings commenced in June 1869 and ceased on 30th June, 1901 when the readings were transferred to the newly erected Wonga Shoal Lighthouse, about 2.5 km off shore between the Semaphore and Largs Jetties where they continued till November 1912 when the lighthouse was demolished after being struck by the ship "Dimsdale" on November 17th 1912. Readings were regularly telegraphed to the Observatory, which collected and compiled the data. The only reference to the method of measurement is that "the thermometer is lowered a few feet and kept there for some time before being read off' (Burrows). Gathering of Data in South AustraliaOutside Adelaide, the first stations to begin rainfall observations were Burra (1859), Mount Gambier, Robe, Port Augusta and Bungaree (1860), Gawler, Kapunda Mount Barker, Strathalbyn, Penola, Goolwa, Warooka and Bridgewater (1861). Clare and Willunga (1862). In 1918, the Commonwealth physiographer (geologist) Thomas Griffith Taylor (1880-1963) [10] published an erudite description of the South Australian climate (Taylor, 1918 p 87-104). In that same year, Hunt (1918) published a comprehensive collection of observations, for all 829 stations in South Australia and the Northern Territory, and for all years of record up to 1917. This was updated in 1950 by Dwyer (1950). Earlier in 1913, Taylor in collaboration with Edwin Thomas Quayle (1862-1955) [11] wrote the first textbook on Australian meteorology, Climate and Weather of Australia, 1913. The intervening period between the two World Wars saw a rapid increase in aviation, with a corresponding demand for surface and upper air weather details. Aviation requirements have since 1937 resulted in regular three hourly observations from selected post offices, lighthouses and met stations. Visual upper winds observations using small hydrogen filled balloons, observed through theodolites, began at the Adelaide Observatory in 1925 while Radiosonde observations began at Parafield in 1942. Radar detection of approaching storms commenced around 1950. Upper air observations shifted from Parafield to West Beach on June 1st, 1954. Upper air observations began at Woomera on March 1st, 1949, originally to provide wind data for the Weapons Research Establishment (now DSTO), and the UK atomic weapons test. Following the opening up of the Gun Barrel Highway by surveyor Len Beadell (1923-95), the Giles meteorological station was opened in 1956. The station was transferred from the Department of Defence to the Bureau of Meteorology in 1972 and, because of its association with Woomera, was and is still administered from Adelaide. Giles is situated in the Rawlinson Ranges, near the edge of the Gibson Desert, at a height of 598 metres above sea level. Additional upper air observations were begun at Ceduna (June 1st, 1963), Oodnadatta (August 1st, 1963) and Mount Gambier (February1, 1964). Oodnadatta, which had been opened as a meteorological station in 1939, ceased upper air observations on August 1st, 1985 when the station closed. The provisions of upper wind data from these field stations have provided valuable data for the aviation industry, public weather and climate services, and computer generated weather models. DisclaimerWhile due care has been taken by the author, based on various references and research, no responsibility is taken by either the author, or the Bureau of Meteorology, for errors or omissions. Comments, additions, or corrections, etc, can be addressed to the author Gene Vecchio via email (G.Vecchio@bom.gov.au). References
Bibliography
Footnotes[1] Inclement weather has been responsible for many shipwrecks in South Australia early history. This included the wreck of the passenger ship Maria in the Encounter Bay in 1840 - on voyage to Hobart from Pt Adelaide with 27 passengers and crew, the survivors were all killed by natives; the Admella off Carpenters Rocks on August 6th 1859 with the loss of 94 souls and the Star of Greece, July 12th1888, off Aldinga with the loss all 17 crew members. [2] His son, Sir Robert Richard Torrens (1814-84), came to South Australia in 1839 where he served (1851-55) in the colonial legislature. When self-government was introduced (1856) he entered the assembly, and he was briefly Prime Minister in 1857. He secured the passage (1858) of a landholding reform known as the Torrens Act, which simplified the old title system. His system has since been widely adopted. Torrens resigned from the assembly to administer the act. Pensioned in 1863, he settled in England and served in Parliament from 1868 to 1874. [3] Kingston had been Light's deputy, then supplanter. Light thought of him "a vulgar over bearing upstart" but went on to succeed as architect, engineer, legislator, and speculator in Adelaide (Kwan, illustration 22). His son Charles Cameron Kingston (1850-1908) was premier of South Australia from 1893-99 and an ardent believer in the Federation of Australian colonies. [4] John Forrest, later Baron Forrest of Bunbury was the first Australian born to be raised to the British Peerage, did magnificent exploration work during his early years. Until his death in 1918, Forrest was prominent in public life, being Premier of Western Australia for ten years and for several years represented the Swan electorate in the Federal Parliament, of which he was a foundation member. [5] A daughter of Inigo Jones married his assistant Lenox Walker. [6] Todd in a handwritten letter to Hunt dated June 29, 1907, states that he retired on such a date. [7] These forecasts were made daily at noon by the Forecast Board under the guidance of the Commonwealth Meteorologist or his nominee for all States and passed on to State Meteorologist to absorb and to locally disseminate (Hogan, p3). [8] The South Australian Government established Parafield airport in October 1927, replacing an area at Albert Park -which ceased flying operations in 1928. [9] Not to be confused with another Hogan with the same name single given name of John who was born in 1896, joined the Bureau in Melbourne in 1914 as a clerk, becoming a meteorologist in 1929 and after graduation as a B Sc in 1934 occupied the position of Supervising Meteorologist (Research) and a commissioned rank in the RAAF during the war years from 1941 to 1945. He died in 1970. [10] English born Taylor was senior geologist to the British Antarctic expedition 1910-13 under R.F. Scott. He was Associate Professor of Geography, University of Sydney 1920-28, and then professor at the Universities of Chicago 1928-35 and Toronto 1935-51. On retirement, he returned to Australia. [11] Quayle was born at Amphitheatre, near Avoca, Victoria. He worked at the Melbourne Observatory, 1890-1908, and the Bureau of Meteorology, 1908-1924. He published on long-range forecasting and investigated the climate relationship to what is now known as the Southern Oscillation Index.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
