SUMMARY
April was a culmination of four consecutive warm months which has constituted the driest start to the year ever recorded in Geelong’s official rainfall record which began in 1871. As well as that, our monthly rainfall (5 mm) was the fifth lowest April rainfall in our recorded history.
TEMPERATURE
Geelong was 1.05 degrees C warmer than the 30-year mean. Daily minimums averaged 10.4 C and maximums 22.1 C; these were above the minimum average by 0.4 C and above the maximum average by 1.7 C.
There were three days over 30 C, the top being 33.3 C on the 16th. The coldest day was 15.5 C on the 26th and the coldest night only reached 3.5 C on the 30th.
In contrast the warmest night was 20.8 C on the 17th, and this was only 0.2 degrees short of the record 21.0 C set on the 5th April 1992.
RAINFALL
Very poor rainfall yet again was the extremely low result over just five rain days. The Geelong urban area averaged 5.0 mm, and this amounts to only 30 mm for the year to date. April lowest was zero mm in 1923.
30 mm over four months compares most unfavorably with the 30-year normal of 148 mm. A summer drought followed by an autumn drought is unusual and the water catchments on 34 % of capacity is quite low, but not disastrous for home owners owing to Otways aquifer pumping and the Melbourne to Geelong pipeline from the desalination plant in Bass Strait.
OTHER FEATURES
Apart from the continued warmer and drier conditions which saw most of Victoria in the lowest 20% of all recorded rainfalls, there was little else to report. There was only one day (night) of thunder and lightning – on the 5th – there were no severe storms and no extreme wind gusts over 60 km/h.
RAINFALL DATA
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