Dustwatch Report December 2013Download

Community-based wind erosion monitoring across Australia No: OEH 2014/0030 DustWatch Report - December 2013 The weather system associated with the severe tropical cyclone Dust activity – increased from November 2013. Christine, that is visible in the satellite image (Figure 4), caused several Wind strength – the severe tropical cyclone Christine caused unsettled conditions. dust events around the 28 – 29 December not only in Birdsville but across Groundcover – no images this month due to data processing problems. all states. Rainfall – good falls were recorded for large parts of southern Australia. New South Wales had some additional regional dust events around 3 Fire activity – similar to November 2013, continuing fires in Queensland. December and overnight 8 to 9 December 2013, with dust levels highest at Bourke and Walgett. The likely source is areas of dryland agriculture. The South Australian Minnipa station continues to record dust from Dust Activity local overgrazed paddocks. The strong winds causing this erosion were related to the severe tropical cyclone. The Birdsville DustWatch station in south western Queensland topped the list in The Western Australian Mullewa site recorded 13 hours of dust – December 2013 with 42 hours at the site exceeding the limit of a moderate haze (Figure partly created by strong winds (over 40 km/h) related to the severe tropical 1). Strong (over 40 km/h) predominantly northerly winds in the early part of December cyclone Christine. caused the hazes and a moderate dust storm. Victoria only recorded two hours of haze at Loddon Plains. Figure 1. Hours of dust with visibility less than 10 km recorded at each DustWatch Node in December 2013 DustWatch Report December 2013 1 Rainfall Totals Rainfall Deciles Average to above average rainfall of up to 100mm was recorded in December The substantial rainfall recorded in South Australia pushed most of the state 2013 across the southern half of Australia (Figure 2). The only exception is parts of out of the driest 10 percent of records (very much below average) and into the central and north western New South Wales, south western Queensland and below average and average decile class (Figure 3) when compared to the previous western Western Australia, which received little or no rain in December 2013. three monthly period (1 August 2013 to 30 November 2013). The southern half of Western Australia had mixed rainfall with the eastern Central, northern and eastern New South Wales received very little rain and and northern parts recording falls of up to 100mm, but the south west recording the area in the very much below average decile categories increased substantially. very little to no rain at all. A similar story applies to Queensland with large parts of the state now in the South Australia had falls between 5mm in the central parts to 50mm in the driest 10 precent of records (very much below average). north west. This much below average rainfall pattern was accompanied by mean daily The western proportion of the boundary between Victoria and New South temperatures that were between 2 and 3 degrees Celsius warmer than normal Wales had falls of up to 100mm. These falls extended into eastern Victoria. (http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/awap/temp/index.jsp). Figure 2. Rainfall totals for December 2013. Figure 3. Rainfall deciles for 1 October to 31 December 2013. Groundcover Due to data processing issues there is no groundcover or groundcover difference image available this month. DustWatch Report December 2013 2 MODIS satellite image Overall fire activity across all states was similar to last month (November Western Australia the fire activity has moved north, with the central and southern 2013) with some differences within the individual states. Queensland had a large parts seeing fewer fires than the previous month. number of fires detected in the last week of December (yellow markers in Figure The satellite image (Figure 4) also shows part of tropical cyclone Christine of 4). Central Australia in general and western New South Wales in particular, has the Western Australian coast that brought unsettled conditions to Australia around seen very few fires, which is good news given the very hot and dry conditions. In the 28 / 29 December 2013. Figure 4. Fires detected by MODIS satellite during December 2013. Colour markers indicate the week of detection. The DustWatch Team Contact us at [email protected] The MODIS image is courtesy of MODIS Rapid Response Project at NASA/GSFC; the fire data is courtesy of the Fire Information for Resource Management System (FIRMS) and the rainfall map is from the Australian Bureau of Meteorology. This project would not be possible without funding from: Caring for our Country; Riverina, Western and Murray Local Land Services (LLS) in NSW; the NSW EPA, the Mallee CMA and North Central CMAs in Victoria; Department of Agriculture and Food WA, Wheatbelt Natural Resource Management in West Australia; and in-kind contributions from: Eyre Peninsula and Murray Darling Basin NRMs in South Australian; and Griffith University in Queensland. We also thank volunteer DustWatchers who provide observations and help maintain the instruments. DustWatch Report December 2013 3 .

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