The Northern Australian Monsoon ( Darwin in particular )

Those totals are crazy, and the storms today are barely moving. Wouldn't be surprised if some stations had 200mm+ by 9am tomorrow morning

Close to 100mm here at home since 5.00pm

From the Australian BOM

"Monsoon arrives at Darwin"
Friday 18 December saw a monsoon trough form across the northern Top End and an embedded weak tropical low develop in the Timor Sea. Monsoonal flow strengthened and extended south-west to the Kimberley the next day. The resulting two days of north-westerly winds from the surface to the mid-levels at Darwin satisfied the 2020-21 monsoon onset criteria, meaning that 19 December is the official monsoon onset date at Darwin for the 2020-21 northern wet season.

This season’s monsoon onset date at Darwin is more than a week earlier than average (29 December), and is a month earlier than last season’s onset date (18 January 2020). The last comparable early onset was in 2016-17

An early monsoon is typical of La Nina. This season, the onset was also aided by warmer than average ocean temperatures around Australia and the interaction of the MJO and other tropical waves to the Australian region.

A deepening tropical low (03U) crossed the Kimberley coast and tracked through the district’s south and is not expected to develop into a tropical cyclone.

A weak tropical low is currently located just outside the North-West Australia tropical cyclone region. There is a low risk for it to impact Cocos Islands for the coming week. However, international tropical cyclone forecast models, indicate there is a significantly increased risk for a tropical cyclone development in the central Indian Ocean to the eastern Madagascar at the end of December into early January 2021.
Madden–Julian Oscillation becomes weak in the Western Pacific
The Madden–Julian Oscillation (MJO) has recently been active in the eastern Maritime Continent, assisting the development of the monsoon trough across the northern Top End and the Kimberley last week. The weak MJO pulse is currently meandering from the eastern Maritime Continent into the Western Pacific region.

At this time of the year, an active MJO in the Western Pacific is typically associated with above-average rainfall across far northern Australia and the northern Coral Sea. Climate models agree the MJO will be weak this week, with some predicting it will remain so into early January. However, the Bureau’s model indicates the MJO could strengthen over the western Indian Ocean in early January 2021.

And this article re last seasons late onset is interesting
www.abc.net.au/news/2020-01-28/darwins-latest-monsoon-onset-on-record/11905974

yep.... been home since 1980.

You fair dinkum had to see it to believe last nights storm ! Smashed the north west Top End ....rain totals in excess of 100mm in a few hours, thunder, lightning ( but not gusty winds ) A real slow moving Top End beast !

Is the monsoon there 'spilling' over here as well? I have enough of the immense clouds in this month, honestly.

I’m so jealous of you for living there, so so jealous words can’t describe it. Imagine having a monsoon season to look forward to every year without fail with epic storms. Add to that a warm dry sunny season and tropical vegetation.. instead here we are stuck with day upon day of stratocrapulus, cold, wet soggy ground for months upon end from late autumn to early spring. F**********k just looking at those palms growing like weeds makes me want to live there now

Great pics and info! Northern Australia is somewhere I've wanted to visit for quite a long time, just due to the epic storm season over there.

Pretty quiet up in the Top End.... as usual when a Gulf Cyclone ( Imogen ) tracks east into FNQ, those pricks steal our rain.
( I scored my first precipitation for 2021 overnight with 4mm.
Its actually been blowing its ring off the last few nights with warm dry westerlies and high cloud cover keeping the overnight mins +29c, which is up there for as about as hot a January night gets at the Darwin Airport.
We're running 1.7c above for max temps and 2.5c above for min temps this first 5 days of January and some shitty high DP's too.....