WEBVTT
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This is the Friends of History Debating Society. I'm John
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Batchelor in New England. Off to New South Wales, Jeremy Zakis.
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The progress of El Nino, super El Nino, gargantuan El Nino,
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means unpredictable El Nino. We're not sure what it means.
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We are watching this because temperatures in the Pacific are
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now at an unprecedented level, approaching 3 degrees centigrade above regular.
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That is super, super El Nino. Therefore, everything that happens
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is now being tracked compared to something we don't have
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until it gets that warm again. Jeremy, a report that
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Southern California escaped the hurricane that came ashore in Baja
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and then weakened. But there's another big one right behind it.
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So what we're seeing in hurricane season in the Pacific
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is an unusual number of big hurricanes. At this time
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of year, I think they've had like 18 named hurricanes already.
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There was also a big one out that missed Hawaii
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in the middle of the Pacific. Okay, fine. We have hurricanes.
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It's springtime in the southern hemisphere. It's winter coming on
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the northern hemisphere. We'll track this all down and compare
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it to the next time. What is unusual about your
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weather coming spring? Good day to you, Jeremy.
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G'day, John. Well, what's unusual is the fact that we're
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getting anything but spring weather. Now, let me explain. You
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may remember about a week ago, we discussed that the
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long-term forecasts were for drier conditions, much milder conditions where
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we would have long periods of sun, fairly warm weather
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around 80 Fahrenheit, you know, blue skies, no cloud, and
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it was going to be wonderful because it's really the
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lead into Christmas period, sort of the summer period, and
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everyone feels happy. Well, I can tell you, over the
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last week, we've got literally everything but that. What happened
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was we first started off with fairly cold weather, so
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we didn't get those 80-degree days that we were expecting
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and those 90-degree sort of afternoons that would have meant
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we were down at the beach. Instead, we were getting
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around about tops of 50 degrees Fahrenheit. So it was
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colder than normal, but not too bad. But then by Tuesday, oh,
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my goodness, we started to get the rain. First, it
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started off slow. So rain showers coming across the coast
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and it wasn't too bad. But then as we got
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into Thursday and Friday, it really got bad. We started
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to get storms. We got high winds. We got really
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big surfs on the New South Wales coast and certainly
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around Bondi Beach and Coogee here in Sydney. And the
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weather just turned absolutely terrible. In fact, It turned very
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much like the start of winter, so really confused us all.
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And then at the end of the week on Friday,
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to top it all off, just to really add a
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bit of, I guess, a cherry to the top of
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the cake, in the town of Aladala, which is around
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about two hours south of here, they actually got a tornado.
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A tornado came ashore from the ocean. went through the town,
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caused a bit of damage, and again, just really put
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an exclamation mark on the top of a weekend. That's
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been really wild, unusual weather here in Australia. So what
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I'm trying to say here, John, is the weather has
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been exactly the opposite to spring, exactly the opposite to
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the flash droughts that the Bureau of Meteorology were warning
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us about just last weekend. And I say it almost
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every time I talk to you now, but we just
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don't know what's coming next. The weather is just completely weird, wild, and, well,
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really unpredictable.
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Tell me about the tornadoes.
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The tornado was what really looked like a sea spout
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to start with. So in Ulladulla, which is a fairly
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small town of only around 10,000 to 15,000 population, a
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storm was in the area and it was just a
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pretty normal storm. But then just off the beach, they
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started to get this cyclonic forming of clouds. So it
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was quite obvious there was a rotation. And then before
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you know it, as it came across the beach and
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hit land, it actually formed into a proper funnel. So
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we're talking a proper tornado that you can seeing the
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United States move west, for example, but it was cutting
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across there in southern New South Wales. And it came ashore,
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lasted for a good few minutes, so it did a
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little bit of damage, not a huge amount, because luckily Ulladulla,
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lots of properties with not too much in between them,
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so there was a lot of space for the tornado
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to go without hitting homes and doing a lot of damage.
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But still, John, it created some damage, took the residents
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by surprise. And I think the biggest part of it is,
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and this is what the most scary thing is, is
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the Bureau of Meteorology, while they identified the storms were coming,
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they really only identified it a few hours ahead. So
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the forecast models didn't say this was going to happen.
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The forecast models a few days out didn't predict any
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of this wild weather. But, John, I can say now
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we finally had a weird tornado as part of this
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whole ensemble of El Nino we're getting here. And what
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comes this week, we just don't know. All we know
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is the Bureau of Meteorology is currently forecasting a very
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Wild and mild week once again. But you know what?
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They said that exactly the same time last week, and
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we definitely got anything but.
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There was a tornado earlier this year or last year?
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They all confuse me.
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North of you. Oh, that's right. That's right. There was
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actually another tornado, very similar circumstances, very early in the
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year up in Queensland. So much further up north, much
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more in the tropical area where you get really, I guess,
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differences between the hot and the cold masses between the
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hot on the land the coal masses overseas. Similar situation
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to the tornado started near a beach basically is a
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water spout that came ashore but really wasn't as bad
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as this one. That one in Queensland earlier this year
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was much thinner it kind of petered out after maybe
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a minute or so and it definitely didn't cause any damage.
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What it did cause though was a lot of viral
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videos because it was very spectacular but really wasn't as powerful.
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Whereas this one, if you have a look at some
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of the video, it definitely looks like a proper funnel tornado,
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which is something that we don't get here in Australia
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very often. It does happen a little bit further up north,
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typically near Queensland and certainly up in those tropics. But
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we're talking about halfway down the Australian coastline where the
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weather's normally a lot more stable. You normally don't get
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that tropical air mass to do this. So this is
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why it's got a lot of media attention.
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Flash flooding, yes. Flash droughts, not yet. Is that correct?
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None to account for.
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That's correct. In fact, Western Australia, so the dry deserts
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to the top left of the Australian map where we
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were expecting to already start to go into drought, they've
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been getting rain from the Indian Ocean. And now this
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is the Indian Ocean Dipole, which like El Nino in
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the Pacific, the Indian Ocean Dipole is heating the Indian
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Ocean up to a different temperature than it normally is,
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quite a bit warmer than it should be, creating a
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whole new jet stream of moisture in the atmosphere, dumping
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a lot of water over the continent. So even Western Australia,
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who should be getting the flash droughts, should be getting
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the really hot weather, just isn't getting it yet. We're
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just not seeing it. Everything we thought we knew about
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El Nino and what we'd see this part of the
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year is just not coming out to be true.
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Why is Canberra getting hit with heavy rain? Is that elevated?
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Is that up high?
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That's high too, which is very interesting because Canberra is
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typically a drier part of this whole eastern seaboard. What
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normally happens is here in Sydney we get the bands
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of rain coming across from the Blue Mountains hitting us
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quite heavily, but Canberra typically misses it because it's in
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a valley and what happens is the actual weather system
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channels up to the north here in Sydney, but typically
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misses Canberra. But because of the way that the weather
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system formed this time, it actually channeled both north here
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to Sydney and and then straight down the valleys into
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Canberra's heading south. So Canberra also got an onslaught of rain,
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and I believe it got two to three inches, so
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a lot more than normal. And in some parts, reporting
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some parts of eastern Canberra, so the suburbs, have actually
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had some flooding as well. So nobody really got away unscathed.
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I guess in some ways, the only normal weather that
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we know of was down in Victoria, in Melbourne, where
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they typically do get a bit of rain around this
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time of year, and there wasn't a huge amount of
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wild weather as far as wild winds. So Canberra, Sydney,
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even up to Queensland, we were all experiencing very, very
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unusually high rain bands, storms, and as we saw in Ulladulla,
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a tornado.
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They're warning for more storms ahead, correct? Some with big winds.
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That's right. This is mainly now up here in Sydney
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and just to the north. So we think, for example,
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Canberra will be spared, but there's definitely more storms on
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the way. And while it's beautiful and blue right now outside,
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especially around Sydney Harbour, That's likely to change as the
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afternoon goes on and the week goes on. We should
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be getting more wind. But having said that, after Tuesday,
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we're expecting to get that mild weather where there's no
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wind and the fairly temperate temperatures again, so around the
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70 to 80 Fahrenheit, which is the same story last week,
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except it just didn't come true.
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Jeremy, do you get big gusts of wind where you
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are or is that north of you?
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No, we certainly do. In fact, what typically happens is
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if the weather is coming more from the south, which
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is what it was really doing during this storm ban
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this week, we get really big gusts of wind. And
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while they don't destroy trees, and I guess you could
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say it's probably really only about, say, 30, 40 miles
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an hour at most, it does take you by surprise
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because it just suddenly comes in like a roaring freight train.
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It really sounds like that as it comes down the
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Blue Mountains. and just hit you with very little notice.
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But most of the time our winds are very much non-gusting.
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So as the wind speed increases, it increases basically incrementally
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and it stays like that. But as you get closer
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to the coastline here in Sydney, what happens is that's
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where you tend to get the gusts because the wind
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mixes in with the cooler ocean air and then you
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tend to get these swirling gusts. So around the beaches,
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especially around Coogee and Bondi, which is just south of
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Sydney city itself, That's where you can get some severe gusts.
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And in some instances, there have been roofs ripped off
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during some of the stormy season where these gusts have
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just literally come off the ocean inland and pretty much
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hit cyclonic conditions straight away, so around about. that 80
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miles an hour for a brief moment. So we're lucky here, John,
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but honestly, the gusts are out there and Sydney does
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get hit by them up and down the coast.
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You've got some cool names. What's Ula Dula? What lives there?
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Oh, Ulladulla, that's actually a tourist town. It used to be,
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I believe, an industrial town on the coast, fishing village,
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same old Australian story, but is now very much a
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retirement and tourist town. So a lot of people who
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want to get away from Sydney, don't want to go
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too far, just drive south through Wollongong, which is the
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town just before it, well, about an hour before it,
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then you keep going down to Ulladulla and you can
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just sit on the sand there. It's not as busy
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as Bondi, for example. There's beautiful bushland behind it, and
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it's just a picturesque, beautiful part of town. People who
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retire there, too, housing's not that expensive still, touch wood,
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and you can really live there and see out your years.
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It's a fantastic part of the world, but pretty isolated
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if you're used to living in the city, I guess
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you could say.
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Really cool name, Ulladulla. You don't say Ulladulla, you say Ulladulla.
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Yep, that's it.
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We've done our heavy lifting of the unpredictable El Nino.
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We're headed to the other part of springtime, which is
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the advance of the reptiles. Jeremy Zachis in New South Wales.
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I'm John Batchelor.
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This is the Friends of History Debating Society. I'm John
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Batchelor in New England. Off to New South Wales, Jeremy Zakis.
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The progress of El Nino, super El Nino, gargantuan El Nino,
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means unpredictable El Nino. We're not sure what it means.
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We are watching this because temperatures in the Pacific are
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now at an unprecedented level, approaching 3 degrees centigrade above regular.
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That is super, super El Nino. Therefore, everything that happens
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is now being tracked compared to something we don't have
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until it gets that warm again. Jeremy, a report that
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Southern California escaped the hurricane that came ashore in Baja
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and then weakened. But there's another big one right behind it.
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So what we're seeing in hurricane season in the Pacific
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is an unusual number of big hurricanes. At this time
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of year, I think they've had like 18 named hurricanes already.
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There was also a big one out that missed Hawaii
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in the middle of the Pacific. Okay, fine. We have hurricanes.
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It's springtime in the southern hemisphere. It's winter coming on
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the northern hemisphere. We'll track this all down and compare
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it to the next time. What is unusual about your
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weather coming spring? Good day to you, Jeremy.
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G'day, John. Well, what's unusual is the fact that we're
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getting anything but spring weather. Now, let me explain. You
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may remember about a week ago, we discussed that the
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long-term forecasts were for drier conditions, much milder conditions where
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we would have long periods of sun, fairly warm weather
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around 80 Fahrenheit, you know, blue skies, no cloud, and
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it was going to be wonderful because it's really the
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lead into Christmas period, sort of the summer period, and
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everyone feels happy. Well, I can tell you, over the
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last week, we've got literally everything but that. What happened
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was we first started off with fairly cold weather, so
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we didn't get those 80-degree days that we were expecting
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and those 90-degree sort of afternoons that would have meant
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we were down at the beach. Instead, we were getting
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around about tops of 50 degrees Fahrenheit. So it was
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colder than normal, but not too bad. But then by Tuesday, oh,
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my goodness, we started to get the rain. First, it
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started off slow. So rain showers coming across the coast
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and it wasn't too bad. But then as we got
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into Thursday and Friday, it really got bad. We started
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to get storms. We got high winds. We got really
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big surfs on the New South Wales coast and certainly
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around Bondi Beach and Coogee here in Sydney. And the
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weather just turned absolutely terrible. In fact, It turned very
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much like the start of winter, so really confused us all.
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And then at the end of the week on Friday,
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to top it all off, just to really add a
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bit of, I guess, a cherry to the top of
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the cake, in the town of Aladala, which is around
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about two hours south of here, they actually got a tornado.
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A tornado came ashore from the ocean. went through the town,
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caused a bit of damage, and again, just really put
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an exclamation mark on the top of a weekend. That's
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been really wild, unusual weather here in Australia. So what
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I'm trying to say here, John, is the weather has
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been exactly the opposite to spring, exactly the opposite to
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the flash droughts that the Bureau of Meteorology were warning
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us about just last weekend. And I say it almost
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every time I talk to you now, but we just
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don't know what's coming next. The weather is just completely weird, wild, and, well,
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really unpredictable.
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Tell me about the tornadoes.
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The tornado was what really looked like a sea spout
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to start with. So in Ulladulla, which is a fairly
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small town of only around 10,000 to 15,000 population, a
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storm was in the area and it was just a
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pretty normal storm. But then just off the beach, they
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started to get this cyclonic forming of clouds. So it
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was quite obvious there was a rotation. And then before
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you know it, as it came across the beach and
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hit land, it actually formed into a proper funnel. So
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we're talking a proper tornado that you can seeing the
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United States move west, for example, but it was cutting
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across there in southern New South Wales. And it came ashore,
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lasted for a good few minutes, so it did a
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little bit of damage, not a huge amount, because luckily Ulladulla,
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lots of properties with not too much in between them,
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so there was a lot of space for the tornado
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to go without hitting homes and doing a lot of damage.
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But still, John, it created some damage, took the residents
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by surprise. And I think the biggest part of it is,
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and this is what the most scary thing is, is
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the Bureau of Meteorology, while they identified the storms were coming,
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they really only identified it a few hours ahead. So
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the forecast models didn't say this was going to happen.
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The forecast models a few days out didn't predict any
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of this wild weather. But, John, I can say now
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we finally had a weird tornado as part of this
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whole ensemble of El Nino we're getting here. And what
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comes this week, we just don't know. All we know
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is the Bureau of Meteorology is currently forecasting a very
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Wild and mild week once again. But you know what?
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They said that exactly the same time last week, and
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we definitely got anything but.
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There was a tornado earlier this year or last year?
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They all confuse me.
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North of you. Oh, that's right. That's right. There was
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actually another tornado, very similar circumstances, very early in the
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year up in Queensland. So much further up north, much
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more in the tropical area where you get really, I guess,
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differences between the hot and the cold masses between the
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hot on the land the coal masses overseas. Similar situation
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to the tornado started near a beach basically is a
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water spout that came ashore but really wasn't as bad
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as this one. That one in Queensland earlier this year
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was much thinner it kind of petered out after maybe
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a minute or so and it definitely didn't cause any damage.
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What it did cause though was a lot of viral
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videos because it was very spectacular but really wasn't as powerful.
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Whereas this one, if you have a look at some
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of the video, it definitely looks like a proper funnel tornado,
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which is something that we don't get here in Australia
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very often. It does happen a little bit further up north,
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typically near Queensland and certainly up in those tropics. But
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we're talking about halfway down the Australian coastline where the
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weather's normally a lot more stable. You normally don't get
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that tropical air mass to do this. So this is
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why it's got a lot of media attention.
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Flash flooding, yes. Flash droughts, not yet. Is that correct?
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None to account for.
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That's correct. In fact, Western Australia, so the dry deserts
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to the top left of the Australian map where we
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were expecting to already start to go into drought, they've
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been getting rain from the Indian Ocean. And now this
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is the Indian Ocean Dipole, which like El Nino in
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the Pacific, the Indian Ocean Dipole is heating the Indian
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Ocean up to a different temperature than it normally is,
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quite a bit warmer than it should be, creating a
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whole new jet stream of moisture in the atmosphere, dumping
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a lot of water over the continent. So even Western Australia,
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who should be getting the flash droughts, should be getting
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the really hot weather, just isn't getting it yet. We're
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just not seeing it. Everything we thought we knew about
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El Nino and what we'd see this part of the
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year is just not coming out to be true.
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Why is Canberra getting hit with heavy rain? Is that elevated?
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Is that up high?
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That's high too, which is very interesting because Canberra is
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typically a drier part of this whole eastern seaboard. What
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normally happens is here in Sydney we get the bands
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of rain coming across from the Blue Mountains hitting us
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quite heavily, but Canberra typically misses it because it's in
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a valley and what happens is the actual weather system
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channels up to the north here in Sydney, but typically
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misses Canberra. But because of the way that the weather
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system formed this time, it actually channeled both north here
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to Sydney and and then straight down the valleys into
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Canberra's heading south. So Canberra also got an onslaught of rain,
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and I believe it got two to three inches, so
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a lot more than normal. And in some parts, reporting
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some parts of eastern Canberra, so the suburbs, have actually
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had some flooding as well. So nobody really got away unscathed.
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I guess in some ways, the only normal weather that
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we know of was down in Victoria, in Melbourne, where
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they typically do get a bit of rain around this
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time of year, and there wasn't a huge amount of
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wild weather as far as wild winds. So Canberra, Sydney,
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even up to Queensland, we were all experiencing very, very
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unusually high rain bands, storms, and as we saw in Ulladulla,
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a tornado.
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They're warning for more storms ahead, correct? Some with big winds.
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That's right. This is mainly now up here in Sydney
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and just to the north. So we think, for example,
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Canberra will be spared, but there's definitely more storms on
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the way. And while it's beautiful and blue right now outside,
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especially around Sydney Harbour, That's likely to change as the
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afternoon goes on and the week goes on. We should
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be getting more wind. But having said that, after Tuesday,
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we're expecting to get that mild weather where there's no
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wind and the fairly temperate temperatures again, so around the
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70 to 80 Fahrenheit, which is the same story last week,
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except it just didn't come true.
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Jeremy, do you get big gusts of wind where you
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are or is that north of you?
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No, we certainly do. In fact, what typically happens is
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if the weather is coming more from the south, which
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is what it was really doing during this storm ban
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this week, we get really big gusts of wind. And
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while they don't destroy trees, and I guess you could
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say it's probably really only about, say, 30, 40 miles
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an hour at most, it does take you by surprise
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because it just suddenly comes in like a roaring freight train.
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It really sounds like that as it comes down the
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Blue Mountains. and just hit you with very little notice.
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But most of the time our winds are very much non-gusting.
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So as the wind speed increases, it increases basically incrementally
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and it stays like that. But as you get closer
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to the coastline here in Sydney, what happens is that's
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where you tend to get the gusts because the wind
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mixes in with the cooler ocean air and then you
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tend to get these swirling gusts. So around the beaches,
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especially around Coogee and Bondi, which is just south of
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Sydney city itself, That's where you can get some severe gusts.
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And in some instances, there have been roofs ripped off
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during some of the stormy season where these gusts have
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just literally come off the ocean inland and pretty much
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hit cyclonic conditions straight away, so around about. that 80
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miles an hour for a brief moment. So we're lucky here, John,
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but honestly, the gusts are out there and Sydney does
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get hit by them up and down the coast.
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You've got some cool names. What's Ula Dula? What lives there?
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Oh, Ulladulla, that's actually a tourist town. It used to be,
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I believe, an industrial town on the coast, fishing village,
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same old Australian story, but is now very much a
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retirement and tourist town. So a lot of people who
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want to get away from Sydney, don't want to go
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too far, just drive south through Wollongong, which is the
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town just before it, well, about an hour before it,
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then you keep going down to Ulladulla and you can
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just sit on the sand there. It's not as busy
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as Bondi, for example. There's beautiful bushland behind it, and
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it's just a picturesque, beautiful part of town. People who
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retire there, too, housing's not that expensive still, touch wood,
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and you can really live there and see out your years.
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It's a fantastic part of the world, but pretty isolated
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if you're used to living in the city, I guess
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you could say.
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Really cool name, Ulladulla. You don't say Ulladulla, you say Ulladulla.
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Yep, that's it.
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We've done our heavy lifting of the unpredictable El Nino.
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We're headed to the other part of springtime, which is
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the advance of the reptiles. Jeremy Zachis in New South Wales.
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I'm John Batchelor.
