Dear Jennifer,
My paper ‘Lunar Tides and the Long-Term Variation of the Peak Latitude Anomaly of the Summer Sub-Tropical High Pressure Ridge over Eastern Australia’ has been published at:
http://www.benthamscience.com/open/toascj/articles/V006/49TOASCJ.pdf
It can be down loaded for free!
The main take-home conclusions from this paper are that:
1. The most important influence upon the climate of Northern NSW and Southern Queensland after the La Nina/El Nino phenomenon is the Peak Latitude Anomaly for the Summer Sub-Tropical High Pressure Ridge over Eastern Australia (L(SA)).
2. The interannual variability of L(SA) is major mechanism influencing inter-annual rainfall variability in Eastern Australia. It has also been shown to be connected to the inter-annular variability of the annual mean maximum temperatures, zonal westerly winds, meridional winds and mean air temperature.
3. The long-term (i.e for periods of 2 to 20 years) variations of L(SA) are dominated by (significant) periodic signals at 9.4 (+0.4/-0.3) and 3.78 (+/- 0.06) years.
4. L(SA) systematically moves away from the Equator as the angle between the Earth-Sun axis and the line-of-nodes of the Lunar orbit (at the time of perihelion) decreases. The magnitude of the movement of the mean summer peak latitude anomaly can amount to 1 degree of latitude over the 9.3 year semi-draconic spring tidal cycle.
5. L(SA) systematically moves towards the Equator as the number of days (to the nearest full day) that New/Full is from Perihelion decreases. The magnitude of the movement of the mean summer peak latitude anomaly can amount to 0.7 degree of latitude over the 3.8 year peak spring tidal cycle.
6. The 9.4 year signal in L(SA) is in-phase with the draconic spring tidal cycle, while the phase of the 3.8 year signal in L(SA) is retarded by one year compared to the 3.8 year peak spring tidal cycle.
7. This paper supports the conclusion that long-term changes in the lunar tides, in combination with the more dominant solar-driven seasonal cycles, play an important role in determining the observed inter-annual to decadal variations of L(SA).
8. The IPCC does not take into account the important effects upon climate of long-term
lunar atmospheric tides.
Cheers,
Ian Wison
Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
I like what Wilson has to say and it fits in nicely with Scafetta.
We are almost there.
The climate of Northern NSW and Southern Q has been blessed for the last 36 years with a complete absence of cyclones crossing the coast whereas prior to that, cyclones crossing the coast were common.
I wonder what cycle that is down to?
And if and when they return, how will our modern nanny states ever cope?
Somehow I doubt that they will blame any cycle, so what will they blame?…….Thinks……
We are entering a dangerous period of media and thought censorship.
We actually entered a period of media and thought censorship a little while ago with defamation laws that used words like offesive and insult, but now it’s getting dangerous.
I’m worried that research such as this, which adds to the pool of knowledge and a possible solution, will not see the coverage it deserves, and even then, not the attention because it doesn’t fit the narrative of Behaivour Manipulation.
Background reading:
Solar, Terrestrial, & Lunisolar Components of Rate of Change of Length of Day
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/04/10/solar-terrestrial-lunisolar-components-of-rate-of-change-of-length-of-day/
Recombination’s key:
A) article Ian references:
Li, G.; Zong, H.; & Zhang, Q. (2011). 27.3-day and average 13.6-day periodic oscillations in the Earth’s rotation rate and atmospheric pressure fields due to celestial gravitation forcing. Advances in Atmospheric Sciences 28(1), 45-58.
http://www.springerlink.com/content/a74n3882q6064530/fulltext.pdf
B) Figure 6 p.12:
Lilly, J.M.; & Olhede, S.C. (2009). Higher-order properties of analytic wavelets. IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing 57(1), 146-160.
http://www.jmlilly.net/papers/lilly09-itsp-cp.pdf
Bright illusion masks hidden crepuscular balance.
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/vaughn4.png
These days it never rains in S E au but it pours and there is enough water going down the Murrumbidgee from my place and surrounds to flush all those would be rice farmers out to sea once and for all.
Indeed some practical and science folk I interviewed in recent days have concluded that “global warming” is a complete misnomer and it’s increasingly more about the magnitude and frequency of “big weather events.” One guy had spent considerable time in Kiribati another; designing and rebuilding after the 2003 bushfire.
This paper in all it’s glory gives us nothing to work with under those circumstances
Gav,
What most people work with is their brain, using their inherent knowledge of what has happened before.
Or you can do what CSIRO do with CarbonKids and infer that the old generation are too dumb to know what really goes on and all this is “unprecedented”…..
Or you can use Tim’s “Weather Makers” to really structure your thinking….
Or you can read a bit of recent history, Dorothea MacKellar, Henry Lawson etc.
It’s all about HOW to think, not WHAT to think and if you’ve spent a long life on the land somehow it all comes across as very normal and satisfying.
I first came to the North Coast in 78 and stayed till 85. During that period we had a wet season. It could start in January, or February and consisted of weeks of overcast weather with rain every afternoon. Your cloths and shoes would get mildew with the constant humidity. Then one night we’d get 200mm of rain and as the land was saturated the rivers would rapidly rise and Lismore, Billinudgel, Mullumbimby etc would flood.
I returned in 92 and the wet seasons appeared to have declined and during the past 20 years there has only been the occasional flood, not the regular floods.
This year is similar to the early years I experienced on the coast. We’ve had a wet season again.
SD; lecture all those downstream from Burrinjuck Dam today if you can, but I’m only on here to test a tiny metallic hot pink optical mouse we found in a garage sale toy box. Silly, but really cute.
Cheers
Gav, I think all those people downstream of Burrinjuck have always known that endless drought and other scary scenarios like “The Weather Makers” and CSIRO’s CarbonKids predict are just a load of old shoes and don’t need a lecture from me.
In spite of all the expert “science” they prefer to live in the real world [even while their kids are being taught to live in a false one].
Gavin,
I wish you knew how wrong you are! There are a series of papers coming out [there are five already out so far] that will force the climate modelers to include the influence of atmospheric tides upon both short-term weather and long-term climate. If it were not for the slowly grinding motion of peer review you would have already be dragged kicking and screaming out of the un-scientific notion that human emitted CO2 is dominant driver of climate on sub-centennial time scales.
A friendly message from one of the science folk you have not interviewed.
When I was young they used to blame the big wets and “crazy weather” of the ’50s on atom bombs and Sputnik.
Alarmism these days is a lot more complex and more costly – but no more sophisticated.
SD
Why waste your time on gav?
He is a regular W Mitty.
Never heard anyone bragging so much about what he did-does, and the constant big-noting himself by saying “some practical and science folk I interviewed in recent days ”
JC, one would think he is somebody we all should know.
Who are you gav? What do you really do?
Where can we read your interviews with those practical science folk?
Don’t keep us in suspenders!
‘…that will force the climate modelers to include the influence of atmospheric tides upon both short-term weather and long-term climate.’
Good news, Ian.
Gav the NOAA reconstruction of the PDO over the last 1000 years shows a natural climate that was much more extreme than anything we have to worry about today.
Certainly the last 50+ years of climate has been a lot milder than the previous earliest 500 years or more from the graph below.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:PDO1000yr.svg
There was a domination of a cool phase PDO for centuries then a domination of warm phase for more centuries then more of a mix, but tending to more slightly warm phase in the last few hundred years.
Those cool phase PDOs must have produced centuries of flooding to eastern Australia and plenty of super cyclones that would make Larry and Yasi look like whirly winds.
But much more extreme NATURAL climate than anything we experience today thanks to mother nature.
Gavin,
Your ignorance is truly staggering.
Your flood Water from the Canberra area and below will have zero impact on us rice growers in the MIA.
Virtually none of us can be flooded by the river. It was deliberately set up that way.
We are experiencing some flash flooding from huge rain events in the last 24 hours but the river has nothing to do with it.
Some compassion for both the farmers and towns like Gundagai, Wagga, Narrandera and Darlington Point who will be severely impacted would possibly be a good idea.
Your attitude is truly sickening.
BTW did you know that Tim Flannery is experiencing problems at his place?
He is in far more danger of being washed away than us rice growers in the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area.
Neville, thanks for the PDO Index, very illuminating.
The most startling revelation is that it was probably cooler in Australia at the same time as Medieval Warming in the NH.
Interesting to compare the 1,000 yr PDO record with the De Deckker graph of rainfall over southern Aust in the last 5,000 years.
Note the extremes of climate over that long period. Similar rainfall 5,000 years and 1,000 years ago, but much drier periods 4,200 yrs bp, 3,500 yrs bp and 2,400 yrs bp and of course the much lower rainfall today.
Once again all these earlier extreme examples of climate are natural with no chance of human influence until perhaps 60 years ago.
Scroll down about 1/3 of the page to see De Deckker’s graph.
http://www.usedrains.org.au/flawed_case.htm
And BTW Gavin,
Amidst all the flash flooding we have had here in the last 24hours, unrelated to the river, we have just driven around our rice crops.
They look magnificent.
We’re very wet here but we’re not going to be washed away by the Murrumbidgee.
Debbie, that’s good to hear. How are your Brown Bitterns surviving?
http://joannenova.com.au/2012/03/the-moons-influence-on-the-australian-climate/ says (with violins playing) ” It remains to be seen how his hypothesis stands up in the long run, but it’s yet another example of a genuine research avenues that are not being followed by government funded researchers who are heavily funded to find connections between CO2 and climate, but not so much to explore all the competing possibilities. Only open research and genuine curiosity will help us to truly predict the climate, inasmuch as it is possible to do so. Farmers, people living in flood zones, town planners, and dam managers desperately need models that predict the climate, instead of models that just give fashionable answers.”
Well cry me a La Nina and favourable IPO swollen river. And what bunk.
Much of the pre-cursor lunar work was done by the Queensland Centre for Climate Applications (see Wilson’ acknowledgement at bottom of his paper) and its successor the Queensland Centre for Climate Change Excellence
(and aren’t they evil climate researchers !!)
by Norm Treloar “LUNI-SOLAR TIDAL INFLUENCES ON CLIMATE VARIABILITY” http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/joc.783/pdf
and others like Williams and Stone – Williams, Allyson A. J. and Stone, Roger C. (2009) An assessment of relationships between the Australian subtropical ridge, rainfall variability, and high-latitude circulation patterns. International Journal of Climatology, http://eprints.usq.edu.au/4710/4/Williams_Stone_IJC_2009_SV.pdf
As gets worse – Treloar was chasing a climate change residual in his luni-solar work.
Also neglected as a mention this work by BoM – a review of much previous work and an analysis – http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/joc.1196/pdf which summarises
“The changes in the teleconnections with the L index suggest that whereas the mean position of the ridge has
moved slightly northward, the nodal line between positive and negative correlations has moved southward.
This result suggests that simple indices defined at a single longitude are not sufficient to explain long-term
regional rainfall trends; however, the search for such causes is beyond the scope of this study.”
There may be a rainfall story in the STR position but it’s not a simple one
And what’s this – climate change scientist, Gerry Meehl, on solar influences
“Amplifying the Pacific Climate System Response to a Small 11-Year Solar Cycle Forcing”
http://www.agci.org/dB/PPTs/10S1_0613_JMeehl.pdf published here http://www.sciencemag.org/content/325/5944/1114.ful
Gee I thought gun climate change researchers didn’t do solar??
But it gets worse for Jospehine – work by our local SEACI initiative – a treasure trove of reports and papers here http://www.seaci.org/publications/publications-journals.html and http://www.seaci.org/
says that a not inconsiderable relationship exists between the INTENSITY not latitude of the sub-tropical ridge and AGW http://www.ccrc.unsw.edu.au/PDF/Timbal_UNSW2009.pdf and here http://www.cawcr.gov.au/publications/technicalreports/CTR_026.pdf
Oh diddums. It’s all enough to bust your meme isn’t it.
It’s a pity Ian Wilson couldn’t publish in a more well known journal to get more coverage and maybe there is some bias against this topic (hey let’s keep the big global conspiracy alive). But beware the ides of cycles – you see there’s so much quasi-periodic goings on in the climate system – El Nino, La Nina, IPO, SAM etc that you can get into statistical tom-foolery and see cycles where there aren’t any. Which is why crusty old researchers roll their eyes every time a cycles paper pops up. Not saying Wilson has done that but beware the ides of cycles. Ask your local stats guru.
But why confuse a good meme with any facts.
Great to hear that climate researchers are crusty old seen-it-all conservatives who reject facile notions of simplistic causation and statistical tomfoolery. Best news since they took the C out of CAGW.
Luke,
I have had many discussions with Norm Treloar about his research. All of these discussions have taken place in his work office in Toowoomba. The first time I talked to him in his office booth we had to whisper because he was worried that others in the office would hear him going on about Lunar Tides again – The way he was acting you would think we were trying to sell pork chops in a Synagogue. He expressed extreme frustration with the higher-ups in his division as they did almost everything in their power to pour water on his research and shut it down. In the end Norm Treloar moved to Canada and I have long suspected it was because of the terrible way he was treated by his Government Employers.
And yes, Norm is a warmist who believes that his research could be used to subtract the natural cycles associated with the Moon from the world mean temperature record. He was convinced that he could his research to place an estimate of the magnitude of what he believed was the underlying anthropomorphic global warming. This in no way detracts from
his pioneering research on the climate affects of Lunar tides and his dogged determination to continue his research despite the almost universal resistance from his fellow warmists.
You also cite the work of Williams and Stone – Williams, Allyson A. J. and Stone, Roger C. (2009) An assessment of relationships between the Australian subtropical ridge, rainfall variability, and high-latitude circulation patterns. International Journal of Climatology which of course is an important paper. The sad thing is that warmists are so blinded by their religious belief that anthropomorphic CO2 is the dominate driver of climate, they were unwilling to even look for the obvious lunar-tidal signal which was present in their own data.
You say that it was a pity it was not published in a more well known climate journal. What gall!
I attempted to publish this paper in two separate main stream Journals starting in March/April of 2011. All I got for my trouble were referee comments that looked to be written by someone who had not even bothered to read the paper. Some of the comments were completely so ludicrous it was difficult to see how scientific logic could be used to answer them. Only after a full year of bashing my head against a wall did I finally get some success with the Open Atmospheric Science Journal.
You also said that: “which is why crusty old researchers roll their eyes every time a cycles paper pops up. Not saying Wilson has done that but beware the ides of cycles. Ask your local stats guru.” Well yes, my paper does show that variations in the peak latitude anomaly of the sub-tropical high-pressure ridge match the period and phase of two separate lunar tidal cycles and yes it wold be advantageous to have a better understanding of the mechanisms involved. However, what you are asking for will take not just one paper but a series of papers to fully investigate the mechanism involved.
And now, is were the real violins cut in Luke, along with the sweet melodies of the French Horns. You see, Luke – because I am not blinded by the Gospel of “Its all CO2’s fault” I had to where-with-all to actually look and see if there was evidence for a lunar atmospheric tidal signal on inter-annual to decadal times scales (~ 2 to 20 years or more). Unfortunately for all those who can’t see beyond the end of their CO2 noses, the evidence exists and it will get into print, no matter what people like you and your fellow warmists try and do to stop it.
Luke says: There may be a rainfall story in the STR position but it’s not a simple one
Duherrr! Who said it would be simple, Luke?!?!?
You should at least make the attempt to investigate and look at the possibility that Lunar tides might be involved. Hang-on, let me put my blinkers back on….
Oh No! Forgive me! How could I deviate from the dogma of CAGW!! I will put on sack cloth, cover myself in ashes, sit in a hole, and beat myself senseless until I see the error of my ways!!
Thank you Luke for leading me back to the One-True-Path!
Ninderthana
Congratulations on getting your paper published. The story of atmospheric tides is just beginning to be told.
I am interested in your thoughts on the last two very wet summers? How predictable were they? And when will the next big food hit Brisbane?
Well Treloar did investigate and thought BOTH were involved. Did you examine any secular trends or stick to your pre-derived outcome?
Nothing like an open mind.
Well you’ve obviously read all those papers in 15 minutes Ian. Well done.
Of course if the relationship with rainfall isn’t simple there might also be no relationship (or not).
Anyway I’m disappointed – I thought it was an interesting paper until you revealed your indignation.
Luke,
Go back and re-read your post March 4th, 2012 at 7:15 pm and ask yourself, is it full of half-cocked dismissive statements and pithy one-liners dripping with sarcasm. I think that you are the one who needs to apologize to both myself, Jenny Marohasy and Joanne Nova. You are so used to putting the views of others down and bullying them that you think that the way you express yourself is completely normal. It must come as a shock to you for someone to call your bluff.
Fortunately, quiet a few people have come forward and told me about their experiences seeing those who dare to question the dogma of CAGW being shouted down and ostracized.
And yes, I have actually read all but two of the papers you posted over the last three years for the simple reason I am a qualified scientist who has been doing this type of research
for well over six years.
And no, the level of scientific interest a paper invokes is not dependent on how well you
get on with the Author(s). Personalities play no role in the scientific method, although I sometimes have to put on armor-plating to protect my-self from the personal abuse of people like yourself and wear a peg on my nose when I debate the science.
Dear Jennifer,
I am sorry that I have had to been so forthright in my comments on this blog. I apologize to you and your readers about the tone of my recent posts. However, I will not sit quietly by while Joanne Nova and yourself are publicly denigrated.
I have pursued this particular line of research on Lunar-tides because I believe that there is sufficient circumstantial evidence to indicate that Lunar tides MAY play a role in influencing the timing of floods in Eastern Australia and also in the timing of periods heat-waves and intense bush-fires in Victoria and Northern Tasmania. I am certainly not the first person to notice this link. There are many who have come before me who have also speculated that Lunar tides may play a role in climate.
As you know, I can not fully discuss the next stage of my research at this time as it is still in the process of being written up. However, suffice it to say that if this work gets into a peer-reviewed journal it will a first step in establishing the fact that Lunar atmospheric tides play an important role in influencing climate.
I am sorry but I am too flustered at this time to discuss the speculative data about the timing of floods in SE Queensland. This topic is only a preliminary phase and it will require much more work to confirm a possible link between lunar tides and these floods.
Ian Wilson (aka Ninderthana),
I imagine you’ve noticed the consistency of Li, Zong, & Zhang’s (2011) figure 3 (p.49 = pdf p.5) with:
a) http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2011/04/vaughn_lod2_fig1.png
[from http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/04/10/solar-terrestrial-lunisolar-components-of-rate-of-change-of-length-of-day/ ]
b) lower amplitude solar tide occupying smaller fraction of high-latitude winter days.
It’s simple: Where the signal is strong, correlation is more easily detected on average. (I refer lay readers to the concept “regression to the mean”, covered in Part 2 of Stat 101.)
I would suggest that we need to be careful with spatiotemporal aggregation criteria due to the variation of circulatory topology with height over the solar cycle [ http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/vaughn1.png & http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/image10.png ]. The boundary layer (with its friction) has quite different pattern shifts than the thermal fronts above:
Mean Sea Level Pressure:
http://i54.tinypic.com/swg11c.png
200hPa Wind:
http://i52.tinypic.com/zoamog.png
I suggest a conceptual framework in which the ~5.5. major ocean gyres are regarded as a network of fluid face or crown gears [ http://www.zakgear.com/images/CrWild.gif ].
Wind-Driven Ocean Surface Currents:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/67/Ocean_currents_1943_%28borderless%293.png
Column-integrated Water Vapor Flux with their Convergence:
http://i51.tinypic.com/126fc77.png
Monthly Maximum of Daily Precipitation:
http://i41.tinypic.com/34gasr7.png
I advise those researchers & modelers who believe religiously in the applicability of temporal chaos theory to heed the cautionary notes volunteered to the online climate discussion by Tomas Milanovic. There are FUNDAMENTAL differences between temporal chaos & spatiotemporal chaos.
Those researchers & modelers who recognize the futility of a temporal-only approach are the ones who will first be capable of the conceptual bridging necessary to pioneer more mature incorporation of hydrologic cycles.
They’ll need help from careful data explorers. Several months from now I will have more to say on network synchronization episodes and solar cycling rate in the context of asymmetric annual-wave domination [ http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/image11.png ].
I’m currently working on a reparameterization of the Paul Wavelet (in terms of grain, extent, sampling resolution, & support) that can accept as input any cumulative distribution function. This theoretical work was motivated by encounters with hard admissibility limits of narrow-grain complex Morlet wavelets.
Note to readers: I’ve no interest in politics. My interest’s in nature.
Credit: Climatology animations have been assembled using JRA-25 Atlas [ http://ds.data.jma.go.jp/gmd/jra/atlas/eng/atlas-tope.htm ] images. JRA-25 long-term reanalysis is a collaboration of Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) & Central Research Institute of Electric Power Industry (CRIEPI).
Thanks to Jennifer Marohasy.
Best Regards to All.
I understand Ken Ring in New Zealand predicts the long range weather based in Lunar-tides.
http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2011/03/10/ken-ring-earthquake-predictions-in-christchurch-nz/
You’re quite the hysteric Ian. What mock outrage. Did I say anything about Jen? Nope.
http://joannenova.com.au/2012/03/the-moons-influence-on-the-australian-climate/ says (with violins playing) ” It remains to be seen how his hypothesis stands up in the long run, but it’s yet another example of a genuine research avenues that are not being followed by government funded researchers who are heavily funded to find connections between CO2 and climate, but not so much to explore all the competing possibilities. Only open research and genuine curiosity will help us to truly predict the climate, inasmuch as it is possible to do so. Farmers, people living in flood zones, town planners, and dam managers desperately need models that predict the climate, instead of models that just give fashionable answers.”
Dr Treloar retired to Canada. He went home. His work got published.
Your correspondence address seems to be a guvmint dept. Dr Treloar’s paper’s correspondence address seems to be a guvmint dept – shock horror. Williams and Stone seem to be guvmint depts. As does Gerry Meehl.
How can this be? Surely they would have been stopped? How could Treloar get away with for years. Why wasn’t he stopped?
And why didn’t Nova tell us about the competing research – e.g. STRi – in fact why has this MAJOR discovery gone undiscussed ?
Why – coz it’s yet another poorly written Jo beatup.
Now you’ve wasted lots of space that could have more seriously discussed the science I have raised.
‘….the science I have raised.’
Popcorn, anyone?
Ninderthana is correct in his criticisms of Luke. I regularly visit this blog and Luke is unnecessarily aggressive.
I would be interested if Luke could address the single issue that causes me the most concern in this entire debate about human enhanced global warming. Why don’t the models, on which this entire scare campaign is based, reflect what is currently happening or what has happened in the past? Why do the ‘scientists’ who have developed these models refuse to allow access to the codes and data?
Point of clarification:
Luke is aggressive in part because Jo Nova (at a different blog) suggested government never sponsored the sort of work Ian has done. In fact the Queensland government did over many years. It would have been a good idea for Luke and Ian to have had this argument over at Jo’s blog – not here.
Luke sees his role here as one of defence of government.
What would be good is if Luke and others could get back on topic recognising the value of the work by Ian newly published.
Well Jen – free speech problem you see – Jo gonged the commentary.
I’m not defending government – moreover good researchers and good research that may have been done by government. Heard me advocating guvmint policy?
Max – don’t hear you reprimanding hunter or Neville for their attacks on me. But then again the perception of being on the “right side”. In terms of model and data being available – well they are actually but you haven’t been bothered to look. for example – http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/data/gridded/data.ncep.reanalysis.html and lazy effort here would reveal a number of models http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_model – but Max are you really wanting to look or was that just a cheap shot.
Anyway I made some science points above – still undiscussed and I did not disparage Ian Wilson’s research.
Max – AGW is a contest of big ideas and big science with major economic and environmental consequences – whatever if correct. The debate is obviously highly politicised and robust.
However I have here attempted to make a science contribution and rebut the meme that government has suppressed this work.
Does anyone want to actually discuss the sub-tropical ridge which Ian points out is a major climate driver after ENSO.
Well said Jen,
Luke is definitely defending the politics.
It would be good if it was truly about the science.
Everybody is defending a ‘position’ rather than discussing the many variables and different theories.
It is leading some to be completely dismissive of real time data and clear observations of current climate/weather patterns.
Luke most of all.
As genuine scientists are quite happy to admit, this type of projective work is inexact. The input data is too dirty to have any confidence in the projective conclusions at this stage. We cannot successfully attach a social and political agenda to this type of work.
That doesn’t mean that we should stop trying to find answers with our increasing knowledge and growing data records.
The lunar cycles could well play a larger role in climate patterns than was originally theorised.
And Luke, that is not ‘making stuff up’, it is merely an educated observation.
It is virtually impossible to cite scientific references to prove a political or social observation.
That’s your problem with so called ‘sceptics’ like me.
It doesn’t matter if it’s sponsored by ‘big oil’ or the ‘gummint’ or ‘wamists’ or ‘deniers’ or ‘tea parties’ or any other label you choose to use. If science gets used inappropriately it becomes irrelevant and essentially gets turned to mush.
An open mind and a willingness to update and correct inaccuracies is essential in robust science.
Because this issue is highly political, that is not what we are seeing.
No amount of posturing will make that fact go away. It actually further proves the argument.
Luke
I agree that there have been prior examples where you have been attacked in a manner that is unreasonable.
I know the sites that you listed and I have been to other sites as well. I remain of the opinion that the models do not seem to work. This is obviously important because a lot of the follow-up material develooped is usually based upon someone else’s model.
Please direct me to a model that is reflective of reality. To overcome the deficiencies the modellers say that a 10 year horizon is required but surely the models from 11 years ago, if this is the case, should be accurately showing what is happening now and they don’t. To quote Ms Hansen ‘please explain’.
Luke says:
However I have here attempted to make a science contribution and rebut the meme that government has suppressed this work.
Ninderthana says:
If the Government is so supportive of non-consensus scientific research, why is that I have had to interrupt my career for 1 1/2 years [at considerable cost to both my financial security and my long-term health] to do this research. All that I have done is take data that has already been published:
Williams, Allyson A. J. and Stone, Roger C. (2009) An assessment of relationships between the Australian subtropical ridge, rainfall variability, and high-latitude circulation patterns. International Journal of Climatology,
http://eprints.usq.edu.au/4710/4/Williams_Stone_IJC_2009_SV.pdf
and show that a lunar tidal signal is so strongly evident in the data that even Blind-Freddy has to wear sun-glasses to avoid seeing it.
Why should people from other scientific fields [PhD in Astronomy] have to step in to do the work that should be done by obscenely well-funded climatologists in the pay of State and Federal governments? For the simple reason that almost all of these government-funded climatologists are totally blinded by their religious zeal for CAGW.
When will the CSIRO Climate Division and the Queensland Centre for Climate Change Excellence [What an oxymoron!] start doing their job rather than spending billions on the religious cult of CAGW.
Luke says:
However I have here attempted to make a science contribution and rebut the meme that government has suppressed this work.
Ninderthana says:
If the Government is so supportive of non-consensus scientific research, why is that I have had to interrupt my career for 1 1/2 years [at considerable cost to both my financial security and my long-term health] to do this research. All that I have done is take data that has already been published:
Williams, Allyson A. J. and Stone, Roger C. (2009) An assessment of relationships between the Australian subtropical ridge, rainfall variability, and high-latitude circulation patterns. International Journal of Climatology,
http://eprints.usq.edu.au/4710/4/Williams_Stone_IJC_2009_SV.pdf
and show that a lunar tidal signal is so strongly evident in the data that even Blind-Freddy has to wear sun-glasses to avoid seeing it.
Why should people from other scientific fields [PhD in Astronomy] have to step in to do the work that should be done by obscenely well-funded climatologists in the pay of State and Federal governments? For the simple reason that almost all of these government-funded climatologists are totally blinded by their religious zeal for CAGW.
When will the CSIRO Climate Division and the Queensland Centre for Climate Change Excellence [What an oxymoron!] start doing their job rather than spending billions on the religious cult of CAGW.
As usual Debbie – you have not read a single thing I have offered and have simply repeated the usual nonsense. Come on get real – and frankly you would have no idea if lunar cycles affect the climate. If you did you’d be a genius. And for heavens sake we’re not talking about projective work.
Yes Max models don’t work at all do they – http://bartonpaullevenson.com/ModelsReliable.html
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2012/02/2011-updates-to-model-data-comparisons/
So Debs any comment on the STRl or STRi ? perhaps? errr no ….
Come on Ian – list all the publications by BoM, CSIRO and QCCCE on climate research in the last 10 years and show how they’re all AGW. They’re not.
If you have uninterrupted your career – well how about don’t. Is anyone forcing you?
Sounds like you’re on a religious crusade of your own.
” obscenely well-funded climatologists in the pay of State ” hahahahahahahahahahaha – mate come on now – who’s telling a few porkies now
Luke
Giving those references as justification of the models at least proves that you have a sense of humour.
Max
Jenny said:
Luke is aggressive in part because Jo Nova (at a different blog) suggested government never sponsored the sort of work Ian has done. In fact the Queensland government did over many years.
Ninderthana says:
I worked for the Queensland Government for 16 years. Over the last 10 years. the chief spokesperson for climate-change in Queensland was a man called Rodger Stone. Virtually, every time a climate-related issue appeared on TV, Rodger Stone would be interviewed to get the Government’s opinion. From my own personal experience and from the lived experiences others that I have talked at various Queensland Universities, (e.g. USQ, Queensland University, Central Queensland University etc.), Rodger Stone did everything in his power to promote CAGW and to suppress any dissenting views.
What you have said above about the Queensland Government may have been partly true up until the mid 1990’s but it was certainly not the case in the last 10 years.
Just for example: I tried to get into contact with Rodger Stone to discuss work related to my paper on Lunar Tides, over a period of almost 2 1/2 years. I spoke to Rodger over the phone and tried to set up at place and time for a chat. In every case, Rodger either put off or cancelled the meetings at the last minute.
On about the tenth try, I asked if he would be available for a lunch time meeting. He indicated that he had just been seriously injured and that he was (in his own words) “on his death-bed” so any meeting would have to be put off for a few months until he had recovered. I expressed my genuine concern about his deteriorating health and indicated that I would be happy to delay the meeting until he recovered from his terrible injuries.
About an hour after this conversion, I turned on the TV just as the midday local news report was being telecast. The News was showing a live broadcast from the USQ. There on the screen a vigorous and fit Rodger Stone being interviewed about the latest CAGW climate scare. So much for the death-bed excuse.
Eventually, word filtered back via Brad Carter (USQ Astronomer) that Rodger would only see me once I had published my work on Lunar tides in a peer-reviewed journal. Needless to say, I have not bothered to call him back.
This reprehensible behavior was not brought on by any incessant badgering of Dr. Stone on my part since I only spoke to him over the phone for less than about 2 – 3 minutes in total lover the whole 2 1/2 years.
Luke,
Why don’t you list all the publications by BoM, CSIRO and QCCCE on climate research in the last 10 years and show me the ones which openly and blatantly criticize CAGW. I am sure that you could fit them all on the full stop at the end of this sentence.
Luke said: If you have uninterrupted your career – well how about don’t. Is anyone forcing you?
So you would rather the research be suppressed and that public-policy [and the billions that are stolen from the public coffers to support it] be based upon “science” that does its best to avoid any inconvenient observational results?
And lets look at what is being spent by the Queensland Government on CAGW:
The Queensland Government administers the Queensland Climate Change Fund which has a budget of $ 431 million dollars. This includes funding for the Queensland Climate Change Centre of Excellence and the National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility at the Gold Coast campus of Griffith University.
The only religious crusade that I am on is to restore the sullied reputation of Science.
A true scientist knows how little they truly understand. They realize that what ever contribution they make it is only one-small piece in a much wider puzzle. And above all else, they freely acknowledge that whatever they propose, there is the possibility that they can be wrong.
I think it’s Roger Stone actually. So you’re basing your whole religious crusade on an interaction with “an individual” scientist. Wow. Maybe Rodger or Roger was unfamiliar with your comprehensive manifesto and credentials? And hasn’t Roger Stone worked for USQ for ages?
“Rodger Stone did everything in his power to promote CAGW and to suppress any dissenting views.” -really ? seemed to be talking about ENSO every time I saw him on TV
And so $431M is spent on research is it? Gee – I wonder where all the scientists are? They musn’t be publishing much – must be 100s of them for that amount ??
“and the billions that are stolen from the public coffers to support it” Stolen – hmmmm – I think at this stage you’ve lost me for an shred of credibility – “stolen” eh….
“which openly and blatantly criticize CAGW.” CAGW is a sceptic meme
Nobel cause corruption St Ian
And I think you’ll find not every child player gets to play in big science. You’re not entitled to waltz into any old field and claim the area. How cheeky.
Anyway – sub-tropical ridge anyone?
Yes those evil CSIRO guys always blame AGW – they’re just slaves to AGW – even CCCCCCAGW – let’s check Ian’s backyard out to see what those fiendish scoundrels reckon
http://www.csiro.au/Portals/Media/SEQ-Drought.aspx
Oh look “The recent South-East Queensland (SEQ) drought was likely caused by shifts associated with climate variability over decades rather than climate change, according to the findings of a team of CSIRO researchers led by Dr Wenju Cai.”
zzzzzzzzzzz
“…shifts associated with climate variability over decades rather than climate change,”
What “scientist” uses such hopelessly loose terms as Global Warming, AGW and “climate change”? How do you challenge people who effectively, perhaps deliberately, say nothing. Are they aware that they leave themselves infinite wriggle-room by using sloppy terminology? Is it just a natural thing, in this age of professional spin and GetUp, or is it a rehearsed thing?
And just to sound authoritative: sub-tropical ridge anyone?
And just to put others in their place (well below me): zzzzzzzzzzzzzz
Thank you for outing yourself Luke – I am sure that the cynicism and bile you have poured out over the last half dozen posts have left your reputation in good stead with the readers of this blog. I for one will cease responding to the drivel that you spew out on these pages.
I am more than happy to respond to any genuine scientific questions about my paper form the many wonderful people who frequent Jenny’s site.
Pay attention Luke,
I am commenting on the inappropriate use of science by the politics.
You know as well as I do that climate science is inexact.
It is amazing how dismissive you are.
The burden of proof of the so called sceptic view rests in the political behaviour, not the science.
The science has largely been turned to mush because of the attached politics.
Which part of these arguments are you missing?
Despite your rude comments, I have read widely, including some of your links. I am interested in ALL the theories whether they are government sponsored or not. I am also interested in much of the generational knowledge that families like mine possess. On several occaisions I have patiently tried to explain to you that we use much of the work from BoM, CSIRO, DPI, SEACI etc in our business. We are fully aware of their uses as well as their limitations.
There will be no one happier than us farmers when the climate puzzle is cracked.
It isn’t yet.
Even the attrocious political rhetoric based on inexact hydrology re the MDB and the Lower Lakes is very easy to spot.
Right now we are helping some of our friends prepare for yet another massive flood on the Murrumbidgee. This will occur immediately after severe flash flooding in the hills and ranges around the MIA.
It’s just as well we all didn’t just believe in ‘the best available science’, otherwise we wouldn’t know that flood plains are not just formed and supplied by rivers. We would also have all left because ‘the best available science’ insisted that we were heading for increased periods of dry, drought and low inflows.
So far according to real data, we have just had our wettest 2 years on record (links already supplied Luke) and the first 3 months of this year are looking to be much the same. We have had an almost perfect autumn break (apart from the flash flooding) and nothing looks to be ‘dead and dying’ in either the rivers or the flood plains. In fact our natural ephemeral environment has bounced back in a most spectacular manner and right alongside that, we have some of the best rice crops we have ever grown.
None of that matches the politics Luke.
Correction:
I wrote “grain” where I intended “extent”.
“This theoretical work was motivated by encounters with hard admissibility limits of narrow-grain complex Morlet wavelets.”
Should read:
This theoretical work was motivated by encounters with hard admissibility limits of narrow-extent complex Morlet wavelets.
I agree with Luke in that we should talk about the sub tropical ridge.
There is much we do not know.
Now that we are in a cool phase of the PDO we can expect good seasons on the land, plenty of sub soil moisture and wildlife in abundance.
Correct me if I’m wrong…during the drought the sub tropical ridge was said to be too far south and we were missing the rains in SE Australia and expecially in SWWA.
What has changed?
And another thing Luke, whenever they talk about models and forcing CO2 into the equation…I automatically discard its worth.
As you well know, CO2 does not cause global warming.
Debbie,
Your writing style is very eloquent and its content seems to indicate that you have obviously spent a considerable amount trying to understand the riddles of weather and climate.
I am sorry that well reasoned arguments and pertinent questions are being denigrated and ridiculed.
The paper that I present here is part of a series I hope will help explain how variations in the strengths of Lunar tides can affect Australia’s long-term climate. Here is another paper that supports the assertion that atmospheric tides can have an influence upon regional weather patterns on times scales of ~ two weeks.
Monthly lunar declination extremes’ influence on tropospheric circulation patterns
Daniel S. Krahenbuhl,1 Matthew B. Pace,1 Randall S. Cerveny,1 and Robert C. Balling Jr.1
Received 22 July 2011; revised 13 October 2011; accepted 13 October 2011; published 15 December 2011.
Short‐term tidal variations occurring every 27.3 days from southern (negative) to northern (positive) maximum lunar declinations (MLDs), and back to southern declination of the moon have been overlooked in weather studies. These short‐term MLD variations’ significance is that when lunar declination is greatest, tidal forces operating on the high latitudes of both hemispheres are maximized. We find that such tidal forces deform the high latitude Rossby longwaves. Using the NCEP/NCAR reanalysis data set, we identify that the 27.3 day MLD cycle’s influence on circulation is greatest in the upper troposphere of both hemispheres’ high latitudes. The effect is distinctly regional with high impact over central North America and the British Isles. Through this lunar variation, mid-latitude weather forecasting for two‐week forecast periods may be significantly improved.
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2011/2011JD016598.shtml
El Gordo – ya gotta love him – “CO2 does not cause global warming.” – oh well so you disagree with Lindzen, Monckton, Nova and Evans then? wow!
“I am sorry that well reasoned arguments and pertinent questions are being denigrated and ridiculed.” – must have missed them somehow !
So Ian Wilson – how about some serious forecast prediction – say like leaving the last 10-30 years of real data off your analysis and model formulation and seeing how well you can predict those data – can we see some model testing on independent data ?
DON”T DO IT!! Ian Wilson
you’ll get caught up in the charade we call global warming..climate change..climate disruption…………
OK Ian – getting serious – if you want to get beyond cycles and drive this through you need a physical mechanism in the climate system and if you can tie it into a GCM you’ve done the trip end to end. So if you could pony up with a sympathetic AOGCM modeller and illustrate a physical mechanism in the ocean affected by lunar periodicities that then play through into climate you’d have something really serious. ARC grant?
‘oh well so you disagree with Lindzen, Monckton, Nova and Evans then? wow!’
Yes.
If Ian doesn’t get back soon we could talk about the sub tropical ridge and the floods in SE Australia.
From the Allyson et al. paper
‘It is surprising relatively few advances have been made in further elucidating and quantifying relationships between the STR, the SAM, and seasonal rainfall in Australia despite the fact that they appear to be major contributors to rainfall variability and may also provide improved skill for seasonal climate forecast systems.’
This idea has merit.
I would ideally like to know what was happening with SAM and the STR over those few hundred years when the NH was experiencing the Medieval Warming?
The NOAA graph put up by Neville earlier indicated it was probably very wet because of the cool PDO.
Paper 2 in this series will show the actual lunar tidal mechanism operating in the Southern Hemisphere’s oceans and atmosphere over climatic times scales ( ~ 30 years). However, it will be a couple of months before paper 2 comes out.
Luke, Can you please stop.
Poor luke, he is played out.
Ian I note you have read all but 2 of luke’s links; I too have read alot of them; and many, much to luke’s chagrin, actually don’t support AGW!
You may be interested in these papers which cover ‘similar’ ground to yours in respect of a lunar influence on climate and more generally a planetary effect on the Earth via a solar influence:
http://www.fel.duke.edu/~scafetta/pdf/scafetta-JSTP2.pdf
http://eprints.usq.edu.au/4795/1/Wilson_Carter_Waite_Author's_version.pdf
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/joc.783/pdf
I see luke has already referred to the Treloar paper.
Thanks carbonite,
There quiet a few interesting papers that slip under the radar.
I am intimately (and painfully) aware of the protracted struggles that each of the authors of the three papers you quoted had in getting their work into print. I was a referee on the first paper, I was the lead author on the second, and I had many a discussion with Norm Treloar about getting anything into print after the thirds paper (i.e. his 2002 paper).
Thanks carbonite,
There quiet a few interesting papers that slip under the radar.
I am intimately (and painfully) aware of the protracted struggles that each of the authors of the three papers you quoted had in getting their work into print. I was a referee on the first paper, I was the lead author on the second, and I had many a discussion with Norm Treloar about getting anything into print after the thirds paper (i.e. his 2002 paper).
cohenite,
Sorry, I meant cohenite not carbonite, I am a bit dyslexic.
No need to apologise Ian because I didn’t pick up that you were the lead author of the 2nd paper! Anyway, given the CO2 debate perhaps carbonite is more apprpriate.
There is an interesting response to the Scafetta paper here:
http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/1105/1105.3885v1.pdf
Luke would be better to stick with his strawman argument. It’s more convincing:
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/the_warmists_straw_man_we_never_said_it_wouldnt_rain/
Ian, let’s concede that I don’t know anything about lunar atmospheric tides however I have an acquired aversion to fancy math developed by those less involved with peripheral measurements than me. As I stated in my first post, there seemed no way we could tie your paper to the current wet.
Now here is a challenge. IMO the weather system behind this Murrumbidgee flood could be unprecedented in the way two major cloud formations were linked across Australia by a large and well defined atmospheric stream over a number of days. I don’t recall seeing another such an event since we had satellite images on TV. Over a decade or so I have recorded floods on our local creek at the old weir and there has been nothing like this one and it looks like all records could be broken downstream today.
Where do you fit in on this one?
Back in my part time study days we had a math lecturer who sold his weekly betting syndicate updates to selected senior students after we analysed n class some of his theories on reading form and potential. I recall the first process was to eliminate all major events like the Melbourne Cup before computing the next layout. Perhaps the full range of events required work beyond the capacity of that institute’s new main frame computer.
For me there was no fun keeping odds under control with the much savaged remainder.
In daylight then I could be working with a president of the Aust –Society building his process control designed around various measurement loops where high level mathematical analysis of recorded signals wasn’t the only thing going on. With combustion, one must have another view of hot masses and so on. Similarly with flow, the area of the water sighted downstream from Burrinjuck can’t tell us exactly what happened above nor can it be ignored in its own right, be it the product of some harmonic or otherwise.
“For me there was no fun keeping odds under control with the much savaged remainder.”
So gav, you think Ian’s paper leaves out or neglects too many alternative possible causes? Well gee his correlations were pretty good and they did include the solar influence, you know, the dominant climatic influence which AGW theory dismisses or ignores and concentrates on the “savage remainder” of the pitiful CO2 molecule.
Talk about the copper calling the kettle black; but hey at least your post was comprehensible albeit wrong; good work!
“however I have an acquired aversion to fancy math developed by those less involved with peripheral measurements than me.”
“IMO the weather system behind this Murrumbidgee flood could be unprecedented in the way two major cloud formations were linked across Australia by a large and well defined atmospheric stream over a number of days.”
Gav, doesn’t your “peripheral measuring” confirm whether this weather is unprecedented or not?
Well then, could it be catastrophic climate change?
‘Orreurs! Tim will want to know about this.
Sorry to be sarcastic but after years of drought why is this not just a normal cycle?
What do they call that observation that simply suggests the bleedin’ obvious?
Lots of situations are normalising, even Arctic sea ice:
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/ssmi1_ice_ext11.png
gavin announced,
“Over a decade or so I have recorded floods on our local creek at the old weir and there has been nothing like this one and it looks like all records could be broken downstream today. ”
Oh my, over a decade or so eh?
My, my that long?
Then your conclusions of “all records could be broken” simply MUST be true?
Gavin,
your ignorance about the Murrumbidgee and your lack of compassion for those downstream from the ACT are both equally staggering.
Face it. The maths and modeling and science are still no match for our ‘actual’ environment.
At least people like Ian are still prepared to ‘look outside the box’ and continue to help all of us try and understand the importance and the strength of all the different variables that affect our climate patterns.
You are instead attempting to defend a ‘pre determined position’.
In other words Gavin, you are locked inside a box.
Some humility re your previous post that demonstrated outstanding ignorance re the Murrumbidgee rice growing areas would also perhaps be a good idea.
Otherwise you are simply perpetuating a myth.
As with a lot of the other nonsense we’re continually force fed by self important ignoramous govt employees, no amount of posturing and face saving with reports that are based on false assumptions ( ie myths) impresses our ‘real’ environment or our ‘real’ climate.
Haven’t you noticed it is not interested in conforming to all those beautifully produced and highly complicated mathematical projective models?
Haven’t you also noticed that it cares even less about the politics?
Thank you Ian for actually recognising that we obviously don’t have enough of the answers yet and that we need to keep searching.
Keep up the good work and let’s see whether time and real data will confirm that lunar/solar activity and atmospheric tides are more closely linked and key drivers of climate patterns.
If they are, then studies like yours will help all of us to more accurately predict climate/weather patterns.
Congratulations also on the far more sensible ‘ subjective interpretation’ of the data.
I look forward to reading your next papers.
Sorry I wanted to add,, the reason I’m questioning this gavin because just yesterday or a bit earlier
Luke was dismissing Debbie’s generational knowledge of the land and environment as unimportant.
And now we are asked to take your ten year’s worth of observation seriously?
More than 3 quarter of that was in a drought anyway, please?
sorry Jen my last two points above to Ian were serious – forecasting skill test and need for physical mechanisms. Gonged at a serious moment.
“Keep up the good work and let’s see whether time and real data will confirm that lunar/solar activity and atmospheric tides are more closely linked and key drivers of climate patterns.” it’s extraordinary that Debbie has never said that about SEACI – funny old world.
I’m dismissing generational knowledge coz all the people studies with drought and climate probabilities show most of us get it wrong. We’re also trained to fit patterns which may or may not be real. And we’re all biased (waits for abuse on CO2) We’re human !
I should point out that I am not claiming that our rudimentary knowledge of Lunar atmospheric tides is sufficient to claim all the observed weather and climate changes that occur at both he global and regional level. Lunar atmospheric tides are but one factor that contributes to the overall picture. Indeed, their level of their contribution to the observed changes varies considerably, depending upon whether you are talking about weather or climate and regional or global climate change.
One thing is for certain, our knowledge of the effects of Lunar atmospheric tides upon climate and weather is almost completely non-existent at this stage and (at this stage) it certainly cannot be used to predicted (if and) when the Murrumbidgee will overflow its banks, as tragic as this is.
I’m sorry Luke,
I have never attacked SEACI.
I was not aware they needed my personal support.
As far as I am aware, they are not directly engaged in this blog.
You obviously haven’t read what I previously posted.
We use their work and we find it useful. We are also fully aware of its limitations. When their work is bandied as ‘prophetic’ I can only chuckle. The ‘real people’ who do good work there are fully aware that it is inexact, as are you.
So what’s your problem really?
My position on generational knowledge and generational records is that they can possibly help.
Dismissing them out of hand as the current political agenda has done is unwise.
Primary source information is also a valuable tool. It has the ability to fill in important localised gaps.
A classic example of that is dramatically unfolding in my patch as I write this.
The ‘flood plain’ I am a custodian of, has precious little to do with the river. We have always been aware of that because of generational knowledge ( including indigenous knowledge).
When the flash flooding began here last Saturday, those who possess generational knowledge knew exactly what was about to happen and also what needed to be done.
They were largely dismissed.
There isn’t much joy in trying to now say ‘I told you so’.
Think about it Luke.
Those from this area who are part of the river ecology are about to be whalloped again.
Some genuine compassion from the likes of Gavin, rather than a scramble to defend a dismissive position, wouldn’t be a bad idea IMHO.
And thanks for pointing that out Mark A.
Here is a piece of speculation on the connection between atmospheric tides and rainfall in the SE of Queensland that needs to be followed up. I repeat, this is only speculation and at this stage I have not extended the analysis beyond South-East Queensland.
The dates of major floods in the Brisbane River Valley seem to be separated by
period of the Lunar Draconic Cycle of 18.6 years. Unfortunately the picture is
clouded by the fact that there appear to parallel sequences of 18.6 years that
fade in and out.
The dates of major floods in the Brisbane River Valley
______________________________Date of Flood____Brisbane____Ipswich
_____________________________________________Gauge_____Gauge
______________________________________________________________
1825____________= 1825.0__________1825________from historical record
________________= 1843.6 – 3 years__{1841
1825 + (1 x 18.6)__= 1843.6__________{1844________Maj_________?
1825 + (2 x 18.6)__= 1862.2__________1863_________Maj_________Maj
1825 + (4 x 18.6)__= 1899.4__________1898_________Maj_________Maj
1825 + (7 x 18.6)__= 1955.2__________1955__________?__________Maj
________________= 1973.8 – 3 years__{1971
1825 + (8 x 18.6)__= 1973.8__________{1974________Maj_________Maj
1825 + (9 x 18.6)__= 1992.4__________1991__________?__________Maj
1825 + (10 x 18.6)_= 2011.0__________2011_________Maj_________Maj
______________________________________________________________
1856.2____________= 1856.2________1857
1856.2 + (2 x 18.6)__= 1893.4________1893
1856.2 + (4 x 18.6)__= 1930.6________1931
______________________________________________________________
_________________= 1893.4 – 3 years
1889.8___________= 1889.8________1889 & 1890
1889.8 + (1 x 18.6)__= 1908.4_______1908
_________________= 1930.6 – 3 years
1889.8 + (2 x 18.6)__= 1927.0_______1927
The take home message is to expect wet weather in SE Queensland about 2029 to 2030!
There is also a slim chance you might need an umbrella in 2026-27.
Good stuff Ian. I love to ponder those known unknowns. I’ll put it in my diary.
Thanks Ian, its up on the fridge as comrade Luke demands.
I don’t like to link a lot, especially to Wiki. But really!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1971_Canberra_flood
How’s that for a flash flood?
When the Murrumbidgee River gets bad, it kills. 89 people drowned in ’52. That was 1852, by the way. The current flood may be as bad as 1974, may be worse. There is of course, no way of determining “worse” with any exactitude. (That won’t stop many pseudo-scientists from using the word loosely, of course.)
The point is, an absence of severe flooding for more than a few decades would indeed be a profound “climate change”. The present flood is terrible, but well and truly “precedented”. As for creeks rising well above old flats…Huh?. I’ve experienced a few major floods, and “little creeks” rise well above their “old flats” every single time. How could they not?
In old weather disasters the puritans and finger-waggers were in a hurry to blame sin or atom bombs or sputnik. Those people would have loved some pop junk-science like CAGW to heighten their mood of vengeful piety. I well remember Bob Carr inspecting storm damage in SE Sydney when he was premier. This “historian” was somehow convinced that such chaotic weather was a new thing in that known storm-zone and he advised us to get used to it. I’m not airheaded enough to use the meaningless expression “Global Warming” in any context, but that’s how our premier explained the severity of the storms.
But back on topic:
Ian, I was so pleased to hear you use the word “speculation” in your interesting posting. That kind of caution and humility makes me feel like reading what you’ve got say.
Sorry, my last post was a sharpish reaction to Gavin’s deleted post. I’ll understand if my post gets the same treatment.
Commentary on ABC tv tonight makes the point that early Murrumbidgee flood records were probably made with a dip stick and can’t be accurately compared to later data. Another concern would be impacts of levees as towns grew.
Btw Robert; my late wife was a resident of Curtin during 1971. She could give a good account of that fatal wall of water that rushed through Woden and those heroic rescue attempts.
Gavin, when 89 people drowned in Gundagai in 1852, I’m pretty sure they lacked levees and that measurement systems, if they existed, were different. One hopes that media outlets like the ABC and Fairfax don’t use these inevitable information gaps to sneakily “shrink” the past. Out of a very small population, 89 died, all drowned!
Well, judging by your comments on that wall of water back in ’71, it seems you have some grasp of what wet cycles mean to eastern Oz. But don’t tell us. Many of us live in the bush and regularly cop the brunt of drought and flood. Tell the ABC and the Canberra Times. Give them some much needed perspective.
Robert; Given measurement was my business since youth, lets suggest that “shrinking the past” by the ABC and others is only a thing created by a few on the far right. However estimating flow in any system is is indeed very difficult. Particularly; the calculations based on depth in a flume are complex and each restricted design must be calibrated against a tank or other known volume.
In my study is an album of B & W photos taken over a decade or two by a local, most probably employed in major dam construction projects for much of his working life. The floods on the Murrumbidgee and one of its tributaries the Cotter before and during dam building are a feature. I can say the recent flows through our newest dam site as shown by the ABC are exceptional and we can expect the final bill will also be comparability huge.
Gav, the ABC is at least as trashy and unreliable as commercial TV. Those who watch it in preference to TDT, Sixty Minutes etc may feel comforted by the absence of advertising and affectations of “in-depth” journalism, but they should stop claiming a kind of superiority over others because they have clicked on one silly and superficial current affairs show rather than another.
I’m very pleased that you are aware of the difficulties of measuring anything large and complex. For this reason, I am surprised that some B&W photos in your study set against some fresh ABC footage, while being of great interest, should be regarded as proof or indicators of current-climate “exceptionalism”. Of course, you only hint briefly at such things before bouncing on to other subjects, including your purchase of a pink optical mouse.
The extent of the moon’s role in our weather is still unknown, and I find that Ian Wilson’s work is worth a read and a think. So let’s just read and think impartially for a bit!
Quasi-religious belief in CAGW and the need to deal with all contradictory observations as heresy-in-the-bud are wasting intellectual and academic resources as surely as wind-turbines waste money and land.
Robert; Crap! I’ve had just enough formal SES training as a volunteer in HQ information management to know what’s what with our ABC and various emergencies as they arise.
Folks; the ABC is a vital pivot in these times so take notice please.
Gavin, as a rural Australian taxpayer, I’m more than happy with the ABC performing a role in flood and emergency announcements, info etc. In fact, it’s what I expect. Since, more than once, I’ve had to walk sixteen kilometres through flood to keep a local service going, I’d certainly expect the local ABC to perform its functions.
It’s the urban ABC’s constant streams of distorted and politicised drivel I object to. I also object to the self-congratulation and smugness of certain ABC viewers.
All of this is helping to distract from Ian Wilson’s research, of course. We are to keep all talk of sun, moon or orbits to a minimum. I get it, I get it.
Robert; negative on “I get it”.
This event was so big that it should have registered in Ian’s scheme of things. In fact the tail of our suck and spit system crossed the Brisbane area in its final stages.
Nobody noticed?
Gavin, it’s a huge flood. As to whether it’s a lesser or greater flood than others preceding it…
a) you don’t know
b) it proves nothing.
It’s a flood. It’s an enormous flood. Millions have noticed its enormity. The comment that it “should have registered in Ian’s scheme of things” is one of your typically vague digs. Nobody can challenge it because it makes no real sense. It’s just more inconsequential smugness.
You are trying to twist all this to fit a political agenda. It’s not working. Give it up.
Gavin and Mark,
Imagine if the climate/weather of Eastern Australia was equivalent to the ten standing pins in ten-pin bowling. In addition, imagine that the lunar atmospheric tidal effect on climate/weather in SE Australia was the equivalent of a bowling ball coming down the ten-pin ally every 9.3/18.6 years. What would happen?
Well, sometimes all of ten-pins will fall down and you would call strike! In this case you would have no problem identifying the link between Lunar atmospheric tides and flooding events in SE Australia. All the major river systems up and down Victoria, NSW, and SE Queensland would experience major flooding every 9.3/18.6 years.
However, Nature never seems to turn out to be as simple as we first thought.
If you have played ten-pin bowling, and if you are as bad I am at the game, when you throw the ball down the alley (and you manage to avoid the gutter), many times you are luck if you can get four of five pins to fall down.
This means that when the Lunar atmospheric tides are producing conditions that are right for flooding in SE Australia, in that particular year you might get flooding the NW coastal regions of NSW and the Brisbane Valley. In the next year, as the the Lunar -atmospheric tidal forcing wanes, the flooding may be restricted Nth Victoria and Southern NSW.
I know that we would like everything related to climate/weather to clear cut but sometimes Nature won’t cooperate with our need for order.
If you have an outside force acting on the climate/weather system that only slowly changes over time (i.e. it peak in its influence over a multi-year period) and it acts on a system that is inherently chaotic you will most likely have trouble predicting specific flooding outcomes in SE Australia.
I agree with Robert,
Give it up Gavin.
Ian has just explained with his use of a ten pin bowling analogy that your attempts to defend a rapidly failing political agenda are looking more and more ridiculous.
Our climate and our environment are not interested in helping out the current political agenda any more than they are interested in helping out anyone else.
It is up to us to keep searching for demonstrably reliable answers that make some sense of our chaotic climate.
There is nothing wrong with exercising a bit of humility Gavin.
Ninderthana (aka Ian Wilson)
said: “Gavin and Mark”
What did I say? never commented on your findings!
Have to post under a different name I suppose or stop altogether.
It’s OK Mark,
I’m willing to bet that Ian has made the same error I did a while back.
I now realise I confused you Mark A with Marc who regularly posts here as well.
He defends the current poltical agenda like Gavin.
Well maybe not exactly like Gavin but the result is pretty much the same.
I don’t blame you for finding that a trifle annoying 🙂
I still want to apologise to you again even though you very graciously accepted my apology.
I’m only teasing Debbie, sort of anyway.
Beaut pictures BTW.
Sorry about the fact that sometimes you have more water that know what to do with, but if it’s stored properly and distributed appropriately then these rains should not go to waste.
The question is?
We know it’s not going to happen under the current arrangements.
Hope is eternal but.
What really gets under my skin is when people comment about the farmers “obligation” and neglect to put something aside for the lean years.
What do they think?
Do they think that farmers behave like the blooming cricket and enjoy the summer not expecting winter? Sure like in every community there are some like that, although they don’t survive long even in the good years, but I could point to 100s of thousands if not millions in the cities who practically live off the state.
But they seem to be sacred cows, not to be mentioned.
Ian; your ten pin bowling analogy is a big miss cause it’s not about your picking up this last SE au rain event.
Deb, on humility; given I’m still your one and only senior adviser on all things measured here, I reckon its about time you gave in on a point or two. Btw did you claim those pics?
Gavin,
you are now proving you have a problem with comprehension inside your tightly closed box.
Ian did not claim he could pick a SE oz rain event.
That was just you projecting and trying a rather blatantly obvious challenge.
Read what he said again.
You got the senior bit right Gav.
Which particular point/s do you think I need to concede?
Off topic – and don’t let me distract you – but Jen may wish to pick this up http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=11099 including Gavin Schmidt’s comment.
Luke I have seen that mentioned on an other site a week or so ago.
Had a look at your link, I have my doubts who is telling porkies in this case.
If Lindzen made a mistake I expect he will correct, but Gavin Schmidt and co went out of their way to accuse him of cheating.
Never saw such a concerted attack on an opponent, but I don’t visit there often.
I rather liked this comment from GS
“[Response: Not ignored, but not particularly relevant. The difference in the met station data is a little more over time (~0.07-0.08ºC/Century compared to 0.6-0.7ºC/Century overall trend– mainly related to the noisy pre-1900 data (trends in the difference post-1900 are ~0.03ºC/Century). Doesn’t look anything like Lindzen’s graph though. – gavin]
Noisy data indeed!
Data doesn’t fit ignore it, and they have the nerve of accusing others, you make me laugh.
Mark,
I am sorry if I confused Marc with You. Please accept my apologies.
I was not really have a go at anyone on this blog – I was just directing my comments to the two people who were leading the discussion at the time of my post.
All I am saying is that my paper does not claim to be able to specifically predict rainfall down to the level of which river system will flood in which any give particular month or year. All, I can say at this time is it will be generally wetter [i.e. it is likely that flooding will occur] in SE Australia during the summer months spanning a one or two year period. I am claiming no more than this.
Ian; Two things-
1 your paper got me thinking
2 In the end, you must relate to surface data such as it is for both our short term and long term rainfall history
Cheers
PS Call up David Jones
Luke,
you are also making me chuckle.
As pointed out to Gavin, a little bit of humility would not go astray.
Climate Science quite cearly has a long way to go.
Being defensive and pretending there are no major errors is not matching reality, it is only matching the politics.
There are more and more well heeled and respected scientists willing to admit that.
Despite your rude and dismissive comments, it appears as if the warnings from some of the ‘real scientists’ should have been heeded.
Some of the generational, primary source information should also have been heeded.
Climate science and environmental science are not yet capable of being prophetic. The input data is not sufficient and it is subject to other ‘forcings’ that we obviously don’t understand yet.
At this point, we have very little hope of controlling and managing our climate.
I hope that one day we will have a better chance of understanding all the variables and therefore more accurately predicting climate/weather patterns.
Telling lies and playing politics does not do anything to make that happen.
Neither does waving around reports designed to give credibility to a pre determined hypothesis.
Ninderthana (aka Ian Wilson)
That’s OK Ian, I’m getting used to it.
Never realised how common my name actually is, I still prefer to post under my name than to use a pseudonym.
Not exactly related to your paper but it made me think about other forces in general.
Many mentioned it before, but why do we dismiss forces present in our solar system like gravity, solar eruptions, other kinds of solar radiations, cosmic forces and many others as unimportant?
After all it’s not that we know a great deal about them and investigated their total affect in detail?
I may be totally wrong and out of my little mind, but these forces hold complete systems and galaxies together and we ignore them focusing on a harmless life sustaining trace gas instead?
That’s hardly an argument from a physicist is it?
and not reading those reports and making bogus ambit claims that can’t be substantiated is also hardly helpful either Debbie.
Debbie – there’s this thing called chaos. So weather and climate futures can never be perfectly known. Albeit that chaos being bounded.
Luke,
Just because you claim I don’t read reports doesn’t mean I haven’t.
I always take particular notice of the ‘subjective interpretation’ and the ‘terms of reference’ and the particular hypothesis that is being tested.
Don’t you?
And Luke….
Debbie – there’s this thing called chaos. So weather and climate futures can never be perfectly known. Albeit that chaos being bounded.
You think?
How profound of you and of course I have never said anything similar at all.
ROFL