The BOM Gets It Wrong (Again!)

In Australia, autumn officially starts in March. So of course, what does the Bureau of Meteorology do? They make a prediction, of course! “A dry autumn forecast for most of Australia. Warmer than usual daytime temperatures…” Of course, the news agencies jumped on board: “Australia sweats through third-hottest summer on record with hot and dry autumn predicted”, “hot and dry autumn in store for most of Australia”. But of course, what do you think actually happened a few weeks later, as we’ve seen a lot of late? It rained! “Heavy rain creates rare waterfalls over massive rock in Australia. Even the park rangers marvelled over the rare waterfalls falling from Australia’s Uluru. All we can do is watch in awe…” Okay, so that was just a one-off event in a one-off location. That doesn’t mean the Bureau’s prediction was wrong, does it?

“Australia's third wettest March on record”. If you look at the Bureau’s website, Australia in March 2024, “The national area-averaged March rainfall total was 86.1% above the 1961–1990 average, the third-wettest March on record since the national dataset began in 1900. It was the second-wettest March on record for the Northern Territory, and fourth-wettest March on record for Western Australia.” It should be noted that the “mean temperature was 1.11 °C above average, the equal-tenth-warmest March on record”.

Here’s the rainfall map for Queensland with areas in green showing above average rainfall, and areas in blue showing 200% to 300% of average rainfall.

Western Australia had massive inland rainfall with purple indicating 400% of average.

The North Territory, home to Uluru, the heart of the Northern Territory’s arid Red Centre, also had massive rainfalls well above average with 300% and 400% across much of the region. No wonder there were waterfalls on Uluru. Even if you look at the actual rainfall amounts, hundreds of millimetres of rain were dumped across the desert!

Australia was wet in March in many parts of the country. So some of you may find it amusing that the Bureau’s predictions were so wrong. But hang on, what about places like Sydney, I hear you ask, that experienced below average rainfall in March? Don’t worry, it may be April, but it’s still Autumn: “Extreme weather warnings issued after heavy overnight rain falls across Sydney. Heavy rain has fallen across Sydney and Wollongong and caused flash flooding overnight”, “Transport chaos as Sydney sees a month’s rain in 30 hours”, “East coast rain bomb triggers flood watch.” So never fear NSW, you may have had a dry March, but the Autumn rains have just begun!

But despite this obvious flawed prediction by the Bureau, obviously, there were no apologies, there were no, “Sorry, we got it wrong”, of course not. Instead, what are the ABC reporting early in April? Can you guess from the picture? “Scientists warn Australians to prepare for megadroughts lasting more than 20 years”, “Australia on track for megadroughts lasting more than 20 years”. Yes, ignore your eyes. Ignore the floods around you. Megadroughts are coming!

Yeah, I get it, weather prediction is not an exact science. I’m not saying it’s easy. But why make these hard-to-get-right predictions? If you can’t get the weather right in a few weeks time, how can you possibly make 20-year predictions? It’s obvious alarmism. It’s catastrophising. It’s all or nothing. It’s predicting the worst possible outcome that is impacting some people’s ability to enjoy life. It can be debilitating for some. It’s the endless catastrophe that is the weather.

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Allégro by Emmit Fenn