Climate
Over half of New South Wales is arid to semi arid. However, most areas in the eastern portion have a temperate climate, ranging from humid subtropical to the northern coast and oceanic to the southern coast. The Snowy Mountains region in the south-east falls in the alpine climate/highland climate zone, with cool to cold weather all year around and snowfalls in the winter.
The climate is generally mild and mostly free from extremes of heat and cold, though very high temperatures occur in the northwest and very cold temperatures on the Southern Tablelands. The climate of the coast is influenced by the warm waters of the Tasman Sea, which usually keep the region free from extremes of temperature and provide moisture to increase rainfall; the annual rainfall ranges from about 750 millimetres (30 in) in the south to 2,000 millimetres (79 in) in the north. In the far northwest, the hottest temperatures in the State mostly occur, and where the annual mean rainfall drops below 200 millimetres (8 in).
The highest maximum temperature recorded was 49.7 °C (121 °F) at Menindee in the state's west on 10 January 1939. The lowest minimum temperature was −23 °C (−9 °F) at Charlotte Pass in the Snowy Mountains on 29 June 1994. This is also the lowest temperature recorded in the whole of Australia excluding the Antarctic Territory.
Read more about this topic: New South Wales
Famous quotes containing the word climate:
“When we consider how much climate contributes to the happiness of our condition, by the fine sensation it excites, and the productions it is the parent of, we have reason to value highly the accident of birth in such a one as that of Virginia.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“The climate of Ohio is perfect, considered as the home of an ideal republican people. Climate has much to do with national character.... A climate which permits labor out-of-doors every month in the year and which requires industry to secure comfort—to provide food, shelter, clothing, fuel, etc.—is the very climate which secures the highest civilization.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)
“The question of place and climate is most closely related to the question of nutrition. Nobody is free to live everywhere; and whoever has to solve great problems that challenge all his strength actually has a very restricted choice in this matter. The influence of climate on our metabolism, its retardation, its acceleration, goes so far that a mistaken choice of place and climate can not only estrange a man from his task but can actually keep it from him: he never gets to see it.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)