Australia swelters through second-warmest winter, reports warmest August on record

Sept. 3, 2024, 4:09 a.m.

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Australia just experienced its hottest August ever, meteorologists have confirmed. Temperatures soared more than three degrees Celsius above the typical average.

Bureau of Meteorology data revealed that last month was the hottest August since record-keeping began in 1910. Several regions across the continent recorded their highest ever maximum and minimum temperatures.

The average temperature across Australia was 3.03 degrees Celsius (5.5 degrees Fahrenheit) above the long-term average, the bureau reported.

Advertisement From the western to the eastern coast, record-high temperatures were documented. This includes an unprecedented winter peak of 41.6 degrees Celsius (106.7 degrees Fahrenheit) at a military installation on the rugged and remote northwest coast.

Australia's winter, spanning June to August, is known for its chilly temperatures.

In all, this winter was Australia’s second-warmest on record, after 2023.

The Bureau of Meteorology said Australia’s mean winter temperature was 1.48 degrees Celsius (2.66 degrees Fahrenheit) above average.

“Both daytime and night-time temperatures were more than 10 degrees Celsius above August average for large parts of the country,” the bureau said Monday.

Approximately 18 percent of Australia is desert, and scorching heat is prevalent throughout the year away from temperate regions.

However, data reveals that average temperatures for Australia are steadily increasing, with climate change intensifying more severe bushfires, floods, droughts, and heatwaves.

Australia’s climate is heavily influenced by three cyclical climate patterns: changes in Indian Ocean temperatures, changes in a belt of wind that moves between Australia and Antarctica, and changes in Pacific weather patterns known as El Nino and La Nina.

All three of these phenomena are affected by human-induced climate change, according to research by Australia’s state-backed Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation.

Climate scientists have already predicted that 2024 will be the Earth’s hottest year on record.

Global temperature records have been broken as a result of rising carbon emissions caused by human activities.

Advertisement This week alone, record temperatures have been recorded in Finland’s Lapland, Shanghai and Japan.