Comparison To Normal Climate For The Area
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Many areas in central South Australia, northern Victoria and inland New South Wales regularly experience temperatures over 40 °C (104 °F) for one, two or three consecutive days, sometimes more, during the summer months. During the heat wave, however, many of these regions experienced temperatures over 40 °C (104 °F) for twice as long or more, on average, than is normal for that time of year. Coastal regions and the ACT experienced slightly lower temperatures; however, these were still above average and lasted for a prolonged period.
While coastal regions may have experienced shorter periods of heat wave, for the time that they did experience temperatures over 35 °C (95 °F), they mostly reached the top 3, top 5 or top 10 all-time temperature records for a number of days. An excellent example of this is Melbourne, which had only 3 consecutive days over 43 °C (109 °F), yet when combined with the record set on 7 February, now has recorded three of its five (being 1st, 3rd and 5th) all-time record high temperatures.
The heat wave was perhaps most extreme in northern and eastern Tasmania, where 7 of the 8 highest temperatures ever recorded in Tasmania occurred during the heat wave.
A chart of the variation of maximum and minimum daily temperatures, through the year, for Melbourne was prepared from observations between May 1855 and August 2006. For early February, this shows a mean daily maximum temperature of 26 °C (79 °F) with the 75th percentile temperature being about 31 °C (88 °F).
Read more about this topic: Early 2009 Southeastern Australia Heat Wave
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