Thursday, 5 January 2017 - Annual Climate Summary for Tasmania - Product code IDCKGC57R0

Tasmania in 2016: A very wet and very warm year

Several heavy rain events brought flooding to Tasmania through the year, and gave the State its second-wettest year on record. It was the State's warmest year on record, with strong winds and warm oceans leading to persistently mild nights.

Repeated heavy rain and flooding, and a wet year overall

• Numerous occasions when heavy rain caused flooding: an event in late January, then recurrent flooding across most catchments during the second half of the year, most notably the record major flooding in early June and with further moderate or major floods in July, September, October and November; many sites had their wettest day on record during one of these events
• Extremely dry conditions at the end of 2015 gave way to generally wet from May onwards as persistent westerly winds came to dominate Tasmania's weather; the eight months from September 2015 to April 2016 were the driest on record, whilst the eight months from May to December 2016 were the wettest on record
• A wet year overall, especially in the north where some sites had their wettest year on record or their wettest for many decades
• The second-wettest calendar year on record for Tasmania (behind 1956), with total rain 31% above average
• Mount Read registered 4998 mm, the highest annual total ever recorded at a Tasmanian station; some precipitation was lost to snow and wind and the true total is almost certainly higher

Record warm nights, warm days overall

• The mean annual temperature for Tasmania was a record high 0.88 °C above average, with several sites (including Hobart, Launceston and Devonport) having their highest annual mean temperature on record
• Persistently high sea surface temperatures, strong winds and rain ensured overnight temperatures were above average in almost all months, leading to some sites having their highest mean daily minimum temperature on record
• Mean minimum temperature for the State was a record 1.08 °C above average, well above the previous record from 1988
• Daytime maximum temperatures were above average overall, especially early in the year when warm temperatures hung on through autumn, but closer to average from October onwards
• Mean maximum temperature for the State was 0.67 °C above average, the eighth-warmest on record

Extensive fires, strong winds, and snow

• Following a record dry spring in 2015 and a continued dry early summer , a large number of fires were started by lightning in the northwest during January; some continued through February with a total of about 123 800 ha burnt mostly in remote areas
• Frequent cold fronts and low pressure systems crossing Tasmania brought strong and damaging winds repeatedly during the year, with gusts over 100 km/h reported somewhere in the State on an unusually high 136 days
• Cold outbreaks brought snow to low levels twice during July, although temperatures recovered and much of the snow melted quite quickly

Record warm year in Hobart

• Hobart's mean temperature for the year was a record high at 14.0 °C, which is 1.4 °C above the long-term average and 0.2 °C clear of the previous record from 2014
• Hobart's mean daily minimum was a record warm at 9.8 °C, well clear of the previous record from 1988 and 1.4 °C above the long-term average
• Daytime temperatures were also mild in Hobart, with a mean daily maximum of 18.2 °C coming in 1.3 °C above average. Temperature observations have been taken from the site in Ellerslie Road since 1882, with a Stevenson screen in use since 1895
• Rainfall for the year was 693.6 mm, above the long-term average of 615 mm; February, March and August were relatively dry but most other months were quite wet

Extremes Maps Records Summaries Important notes the top

* note: Mount Read was affected by wind, snow and outages on several occasions during the year, so the exact total is not known but is almost certainly higher. The highest total from a manual site was 3255.0 mm at Queenstown (South Queenstown)

Extremes Maps Records Summaries Important notes the top

Maps
	Observed	Anomaly	Decile rank
Total rainfall
Mean daily maximum temperatures
Mean daily minimum temperatures

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Monthly maps
	Rainfall rank	Maximum temperature rank	Minimum temperature rank
January
February
March
April
May
June
July
August
September
October
November
December

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* note: there are gaps in the historical record at this site, so it is possible a higher value has gone unreported

Extremes Maps Records Summaries Important notes the top

Extremes Maps Records Summaries Important notes the top