Top End Wet Season 2021-2022

When the Monsoon buggers off to the north, we revert to hot torrid 'build up' conditions

Nothing much out there on the lightning tracker this morning....although a nice morning at Opium Creek Station to the east of Darwin...

Darwin Harbour sunrise this morning.

And in Kakadu at Yellow Waters.

Not only the Top End, the whole of the Continent north of the Tropic of Capricorn is just about storm free...And in February !!

With a bit of luck this Arnhemland Gulfline will make it through to Darwin overnight, but I'm not holding my breath.....

Another shitty 'monsoonal break' type of day, but not as shitty as yesterday...

Storms look like they are too far south to impact the north coast.

Last nights storm out Adelaide River way ( by Chris Garth, local storm chaser )

You know how we are all grizzling about this 'monsoonal break' dry spell ?
Well here is what they look like back to 1941 for our two wettest wet season months.
No, I'm not counting March as many years the wet buggers off mid month....
Consecutive days of zero recorded rain in Jan and Feb.
January:-
2018 - 8 days
2016 - 8 days
2012 - 10 days
1992 - 8 days
1960 - 7 days
1951 - 7 days
1950 - 7 days
1948 - 10 days.
February:-
2020 - 7 days
2019 - 8 days
1979 - 9 days
1973 - 10 days
1964 - 10 days
1942 - 8 days
And a more than honourable mention to Jan-Feb 1959 with 12 consecutive days rainless.
There are lots of other examples of 5 and 6 day dry spells in the last 80 years.
Be that as it may, I'm looking at 7 rainless days here at Leanyer Heights and may have to resort to the sprinklers tomorrow.

Looking hopefull for another monsoonal burst towards the end of the month....bring it on !
From 'Pilko's Chat On Weather' this morning ( Cameron Hinzey )
"Starting to look like we might have a nice strong pulse of the MJO moving through towards the end of Feb and early March. Basically the further outside the centre circle the line is, the stronger the Mjo.
A strong mjo this time of year could really lead to some big rains and probably increase the chance of a cyclone or two spinning up around Australia somewhere over the next few weeks".

A real banger of a Top End gulf line storm ( from the east ) made a bullseye on Darwin in the wee small hours....c/w torrential rain, gusty winds and some of the loudest thunder, the kind that actually shakes the house ! In local vernacular, this is what is termed 'a fucken ball tearer !
And whilst the rain has stopped and there is all but the slightest rumbles and flashes out over the sea to the west, the green tree frogs are absolutely going off calling for a hook up. The decible level of the frogs is about the same as the loudest claps of thunder......"shut up you noisy bastards !"
27mm at the Airport in an hour between 1.30am-2.30am, 30.8mm here at home.