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Why don't you request the data? You could probably get it for little or no cost from your met. organisation. Even ours now provides free access to an extensive database - after an earlier period of loony-tunes economics set up ridiculous charges for what should always have stayed in the public domain.
Good idea. Might do that sometime.
Though I'm not sure if I want to know precisely how bad our summer was.
Pretty unusual. I'd expect half of the summer to be cloudy and the other half sunny but it's been completely cloudy about 80% of the days since June 1st. Most of the nice days were in June as well...
Pretty unusual. I'd expect half of the summer to be cloudy and the other half sunny but it's been completely cloudy about 80% of the days since June 1st. Most of the nice days were in June as well...
It's raining right now.
May especially looked promising, and I think June was decent for sunshine too.
July onward has been a bit of a disappointment for sunshine.
Do any meteorologists know why both Candle and I are seeing very cloudy conditions, simultaneously?
PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE ANCHORAGE AK 1245 PM AKDT SAT AUG 14 2010
...RECORD SET FOR CONSECUTIVE DAYS OF PRECIPITATION IN ANCHORAGE...
RAIN FELL ONCE AGAIN EARLY THIS AFTERNOON AT THE ANCHORAGE NATIONAL
WEATHER SERVICE OFFICE ON SAND LAKE ROAD. THIS MEANS TODAY MARKS THE
TWENTY-EIGHTH CONSECUTIVE DAY THAT PRECIPITATION HAS FALLEN IN
ANCHORAGE. THIS SURPASSES THE PREVIOUS RECORD OF 27 DAYS SET IN
NOV/DEC OF 1951.
NEAR AVERAGE AMOUNTS OF PRECIPITATION FELL FROM JANUARY TO MARCH IN
THE ANCHORAGE AREA...WHILE APRIL AND MAY WERE SIGNIFICANTLY WETTER
AND DRIER THAN AVERAGE...RESPECTIVELY. SINCE JUNE 1ST
HOWEVER...6.26" OF RAIN HAS FALLEN...WHICH IS 2.37" ABOVE NORMAL.
ANCHORAGE HAS ONLY SEEN 15 DAYS WITH NO PRECIPITATION IN THE 75 DAYS
THAT HAVE PASSED SINCE JUNE 1ST.
THIS SUMMER'S ABNORMALLY WET AND COOL WEATHER PATTERN IS THE RESULT
OF A LARGE UPPER LEVEL TROUGH THAT HAS BEEN POSITIONED IN THE
CENTRAL AND EASTERN BERING SEA SINCE EARLY JUNE. AREAS OF LOW
PRESSURE DEVELOP AT THE BASE OF THE TROUGH...TAP INTO THE
SUBTROPICAL MOISTURE...AND MOVE NORTHEAST TOWARD THE GULF OF ALASKA.
THE RESULT HAS BEEN AN INCREASE IN CLOUD COVERAGE AND RAIN EVENTS FOR
SOUTHERN ALASKA.
CONSECUTIVE DAYS WITH A TRACE OR MORE OF PRECIPITATION
------------------------------------------------------
YEAR DATES NUMBER OF DAYS
------------------------------------------------------
1. 2010 JUL 18 - AUG 14* 28*
2. 1951 NOV 28 - DEC 24 27
3. 1946 JAN 22 - FEB 15 25
4. 2008 SEP 02 - SEP 25 24
1989 AUG 22 - SEP 14 24
1950/1951 DEC 28 - JAN 20 24
7. 2008 NOV 25 - DEC 17 23
8. 1947 JAN 03 - JAN 24 22
* AS OF NOON AUGUST 14
MONTHLY PRECIPITATION TOTALS FOR 2010
-------------------------------------------
MONTH OBSERVED DEPARTURE FROM
PRECIP (IN) NORMAL (IN)
-------------------------------------------
JANUARY 0.61 -0.07
FEBRUARY 0.91 0.17
MARCH 0.62 -0.03
APRIL 1.21 0.69
MAY 0.20 -0.50
JUNE 1.21 0.15
JULY 3.27 1.57
AUGUST 1.78* 0.65* .......................................
TOTALS 9.81* 2.63*
Adelaide seems cloudier than I'd expect for summer for a semi-arid, mediterranean city.
Hobart, Melbourne and Canberra all had less cloudy days.
Brisbane is still looking better than Sydney with less cloudy days. Fluke?
I was expecting Darwin to be cloudier, but I thought Brisbane's summer was also wetter than Sydney's.
Sydney was nearly as cloudy as Darwin.
Your crude calculation seems good,
as places closer to the equator with shorter summer days have more lenient expectations for % chance of sun.
Adelaide still averages 72% possible (astronomical) Dec-Feb and 74% Jan-Mar, pretty good. Brisbane outscores Sydney throughout the year in % terms, by about 7% in summer. On average Darwin is 8% lower than Sydney in summer.
Adelaide still averages 72% possible (astronomical) Dec-Feb and 74% Jan-Mar, pretty good. Brisbane outscores Sydney throughout the year in % terms, by about 7% in summer. On average Darwin is 8% lower than Sydney in summer.
Could be wrong here but suspect the rainfall in Brisbane in summer tends to happen in shorter and more intense bursts.
This could explain the less cloudy conditions but similar rainfall totals.
Adelaide still averages 72% possible (astronomical) Dec-Feb and 74% Jan-Mar, pretty good.
Brisbane outscores Sydney throughout the year in % terms, by about 7% in summer.
On average Darwin is 8% lower than Sydney in summer.
At worst, I suspect any month in Adelaide will feel like a marginal improvement over Toronto.
It's just weird how their extra aridity doesn't seem to increase their chance of sun much over the rest of southeastern Oz.
Plus Adelaide's 19 days vs. Perth's 2 days is a stark contrast, though their climates are similar.
Sounds like Brisbane's % chance of sun difference would be barely noticeable,
however that's impressive that it's closer to the Northern Wet storms,
yet it certainly doesn't harm their chance of sun vs. Sydney.
An addition to the Australian main centre analysis.
Below are the total number of days with 0 sunshine hours by main centre, from 1 Aug 2009 to 31 Jul 2010 (12 month's data):
Adelaide 6
Brisbane 12
Canberra 10
Darwin 6
Hobart 10
Melbourne 17
Perth 2
Sydney 22
These are days I would rather be stuck inside with a good book or a DVD fest !!
Sydney is the champ here and these days are often strung together. More likely to occur in the summer months as well (at least for Darwin, Sydney and Brisbane)
Could be wrong here but suspect the rainfall in Brisbane in summer tends to happen in shorter and more intense bursts.
This could explain the less cloudy conditions but similar rainfall totals.
Yep, that would be right. And the year to year variability would be greater than at Sydney.
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