Crocodiles roam streets in Queensland, Australia after record-breaking floods. Tasmania burns.

I keep vigil.

Poor Australia. Extreme weather events are being amplified by climate change on the continent "as they are occurring in an atmosphere that contains more energy than 50 years ago" reports Sydney’s Climate Council report titled Weather Gone Wild.

The global average surface temperature in 2018 was between 0.9 and 1.1°C above the late 19th century average (between 1880 and 1900) (Carbon Brief 2019). The actual temperature rise for 2018 would be slightly higher if a preindustrial baseline were used. Globally, 2016 remains the hottest year on record (1.2°C above the pre-industrial era). 2017 and 2015 were both 1.1°C above pre-industrial levels (with 2015 being less than one hundredth of a degree hotter than 2017) (WMO 2018a). This made 2018 the fourth hottest year on record for surface air temperature

Deutsche Presse-Agentur GmbH (DPA ; German Press Agency)  summarizes the findings published today.

CANBERRA (DPA) - An increase in the severity and frequency of extreme weather conditions in Australia last year is "a new norm driven by climate change," according to a report released on Wednesday (Feb 6).

Temperatures nudged 50 degrees Celsius, bushfires ravaged rainforests and people were at increased risk of cardiac arrests because of heatwaves, the Sydney-based environmental group Climate Council said in its report.

It comes as hundreds of people wait in evacuation centres after 10 days of torrential rain and flooding in north-east Australia, while month-long bushfires have ravaged almost 200,000 hectares of land in Tasmania.

snip

Heatwaves are starting earlier, becoming longer, hotter and occurring more frequently, the report said, adding that there were twelve times more hot temperature than cold temperature records set in Australia between 2000-14.

snip

Climate Council chief executive Amanda McKenzie said Australia's conservative government, which has been in power for five years, has obstructed action on climate change while extreme weather worsens.  "It's unconscionable," she said.

z

After a blistering heatwave in January, that sparked wildfires and casualties for wildlife and livestock. Now a once in a century flood occurred in the tropics of Queensland.

One city, Townsville, received 3.8 feet of rainfall over seven days. My god! Does anybody know how many raindrops are in almost 4 feet of water? The high floodwaters have enabled snakes and crocodiles to infiltrate urban areas.

ABC reports:

The Australian government is warning citizens to be on the look out for crocodiles and snakes in the streets amid severe rainfall and flooding in north Queensland over the past few days.

“Crocodiles prefer calmer waters and they may move around in search of a quiet place to wait for floodwaters to recede,” Leeanne Enoch, Queensland's minister for environment, said in a statement Monday.

She continued, “Crocodiles may be seen crossing roads, and when flooding recedes, crocodiles can turn up in unusual places such as farm dams or waterholes where they have not been seen before. Similarly, snakes are very good swimmers and they too may turn up unexpectedly.”

Wildfire Today reports on the wild fires in Tasmania:

Climate change has already brought alarming change to Tasmania, the huge island south of the Australian mainland. Until recently it was assumed that the climate differences would not be massive since it was thought by some that the ocean surrounding the island would not be heating as quickly as it was in other areas.

Now the southwest area of the state, the heart of its world heritage area, is being described as dying — the rainforest and heathlands are beginning to disappear. The nearby seas, it turns out, are warming at two to three times the global rate.

Richard Flanagan writes about this issue in an opinion article at The Guardian.

…Then there was the startlingly new phenomenon of widespread dry lightning storms. Almost unknown in Tasmania until this century they had increased exponentially since 2000, leading to a greatly increased rate of fire in a rapidly drying south-west. Compounding all this, winds were also growing in duration, further drying the environment and fuelling the fires’ spread and ferocity.

Such a future would see these fires destroy Tasmania’s globally unique rainforests and mesmerizing alpine heathlands. Unlike mainland eucalyptus forest these ecosystems do not regenerate after fire: they would vanish forever. Tasmania’s world heritage area was our Great Barrier Reef, and, like the Great Barrier Reef, it seemed doomed by climate change.