Record rains hit Sydney

The capital of New South Wales has just broken a new record: 537 mm of precipitation fell during the month in Sydney, which makes March 2022 the March wettest on record since 1942. The past month is also the sixth wettest month of all months. This finding is all the more surprising since March is not usually the wettest month of the year, with 80 mm of rain on average. The rainiest months are generally those of February and June, with more than 100 mm. In the middle of the week, several areas of Sydney were swept by floods lightning, forcing many residents to evacuate.

In recent years, Sydney’s climate seems to have changed with more rain in summer (currently) and less in winter. A few kilometers away, in Ballina in the same region, it fell 919 mm in the space of a few days.

A still rainy month of April in anticipation

Since the end of February, eastern Australia has been constantly confronted with ” atmospheric rivers “, bands of water vapor that circulate in the atmosphere and give rise to torrential rains on the land. These precipitations are probably related to the La Nina phenomenon which is extended for the second consecutive year and which could last another 5 to 6 months. That anomaly Pacific water temperature has consequences for the climate in Australia, but it is also possible that the rainfall potential of atmospheric rivers has also been enhanced by global warming.

The forecasts for the next two weeks seem in any case to indicate precipitation again above normal until mid-April, on soils already saturated with water.