It looks as though we’re living in the 70s again.
No, I’m not talking about the fashionable left’s renewed sympathy towards normalising paedophilia, which reached its previously oleaginous apex in the “sexual liberation” 70s — I’m talking about the weather. Namely, that it’s bloody cold and very, very wet.
As you may be aware, it’s been raining in Eastern Australia. A lot. And it’s shaping up to be yet another cool, damp summer.
A prolonged rain event across eastern Australia is likely to cause flooding rain from central Queensland to Tasmania this week.
For the Murray-Darling Basin the forecast is dire following seven consecutive weeks of rain and already the worst flooding in decades travelling along several rivers.
“In decades”, note.
Because, back in the 70s, it seemed like I was forever sloshing to school in gumboots and a parka. The records back up my recollections: Bureau of Meteorology charts show that the 70s was one of the wettest periods in the past century or so. It was also one of the coldest: that’s why the climate alarmism of the day was “the coming Ice Age”, rather than “global warming”.
Rain-wise, at least, the last few years might be shaping up on par with the era of flares and ridiculous sideburns.
Computer modelling currently indicates anywhere from Rockhampton to the Victorian ranges, along with pockets of eastern Tasmania, are likely to receive an average of 50mm to 100mm of rain from Tuesday to Monday.
That’s enough to send October rain records tumbling following heavy rain last week.
Some towns along the slopes and ranges, the source of Murray-Darling flood peaks, will receive well over 100mm — which is about double the October average.
It’s all enough to make a Climate Cultist cry.
Even before a drop of rain falls this week, a flood warning is already current for 28 rivers across the Murray-Darling Basin, along with a handful in Tasmania and southern Victoria.
The combination of heavy rain, wet catchments, full dams and swollen rivers is likely to result in the highest river levels in years for some towns inland from the Great Dividing Range — even for regions which have already seen several floods this year.
For regions downstream from the ranges, where flood peaks travel slowly, this next bout of rain will prolong the road closures and isolation for weeks to come.
All south-east inland rivers eventually discharge into the Murray where the flow to South Australia is the highest since 2016 at nearly 80 gigalitres per day.
The ongoing flood crisis upstream could send the flow rate to the highest level in decades before the start of summer.
ABC Australia
And to think, only a few years ago, we were never going to see flooding rains again.
Might be time to break out the brown flares and gumboots.
