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October '14: winners and losers for the month that was

Max Gonzalez, Friday October 31, 2014 - 13:26 AEDT

If the monthly weather could be summarised by a song title, what would it be?

It was all quiet on the western front with Perth temperatures reaching an average of 18.5 degrees (maximum and minimum combined) for October, which is just about one degree above the norm. With 37 mm of rain, the city was just below its monthly average. Despite this, Perthians were left walking on sunshine with an average of 10 hours of sunlight per day, more than any other capital except Darwin and Brisbane.

Further east, Adelaideans endured their hottest October in 100 years with an average temperature of 18.9 degrees (two above the norm) and their second hottest on record. The city of churches was left high and dry with only five millimetres in the rain gauge, only 11 percent of its monthly average. This made it the driest October since 2006 and fourth driest on record. Perhaps more significantly was the fact that October 2014 was the driest month for Adelaide since February 2009, when only 0.8 mm fell on the rain gauges.

Across the Bass Strait, Hobart was left hot and cold with temperatures close to one degree warmer than average at 13.2 degrees. Despite having their warmest October since 2010 and 6th warmest in the past 20 years, Hobart citizens were left chilled to bone twice this month as temperatures plummeted to three degrees on the 17th and six degrees on Tuesday 28th. This was cold enough to bring snow to the mighty Mt Wellington. With 50 mm of rain, Hobart saw about 80 percent of its October average rainfall.

In the near future, however, we all seem to be on the same boat as above-average temperatures and below-average rainfall are forecast for the majority of Australia.

- Weatherzone

© Weatherzone 2014

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