Annual Weather Review
Armidale NSW - 2011

© Compiled and written by Peter Burr, using data recorded at the Bureau of Meteorology weather station at East Armidale. No part of this review may be reproduced for commercial purposes without prior permission from the author.


2011 was a cloudy, slightly cooler than normal year with well above average rainfall. Fine sunny conditions prevailed on 145 days with rain on 138 days.

RAINFALL:  It was Armidale’s wettest year since 1950 with a total of 1,048 millimetres, 261 mm higher than the long term average. Rainfall was above average in all months except March and July. The wettest month was November with 244.4 mm which was a record high for that month, and the driest was July with 13.6 mm. The highest daily fall was 87.6 mm on 24th November. The higher than normal rainfall throughout the year caused flooding on a number of days. See ‘Floods’ section below for dates.

TEMPERATURES:  Because of the wetter and cloudier than normal conditions for much of the year, temperatures were overall cooler than the LTA. Temperatures were noticeably warmer than normal in February and November, and significantly cooler than normal in October and December. Average maximum temperatures in December were the lowest on record (147 years of records, the previous lowest was in 1927). The hottest day of the year was 26th January at 34.4 degrees, the coldest day was 19th July with a maximum of 7.2 degrees, and the coldest overnight temperature was -7.7 degrees on 12th July.

WINDS:  Winds were light in March, April, May and August, and light to moderate in all other months. The year totalled 10 windy days* (annual average 19 days).
Winds at 3pm were westerly on 109 days, easterly on 100 days, south-westerly on 64 days, south-easterly on 43 days, north-easterly on 17 days, southerly on 17 days, north-westerly on 14 days, and northerly on 1 day.  

EVAPORATION:  Due to the high number of cloudy days, evaporation was much lower than normal. Total for the year was 933.6 millimetres which was 265 mm less than the LTA. Average daily evaporation for the year was 2.6 mm.

FROSTS:  Total frosts for the year was 105 which was 6 more than the LTA. August was the frostiest month recording 22 frosts. There were 36 light frosts, 47 moderate frosts and 22 severe frosts. The first frost was on 12th April which produced a frost-free period of 111 days over the summer of 2010-11. The last frost was on 22nd October.

FOGS:  There were fogs on 34 days which is close to the annual average. The foggiest month was August with fogs on 9 days. All fogs were in the early mornings with none in the evenings.    

SNOW:  There were no snowfalls in the centre of the city, however there was a light snow shower in South Armidale at 2pm on 19th July. The annual average is 2.2 days of snow. The official last snowfall in Armidale was on 9th July 2008.

THUNDERSTORMS:  Thunderstorm activity was close to normal with storms on 34 days. February and March were the months with the most storms (5 days in each month), and June and July were thunderstorm-free.

HAIL:
 Hail fell on 5 days - 9th May (up to 5mm diameter), 9th August (soft hail), 18th August (soft hail), 29th September (2 falls of soft hail), 25th October (up to 10mm diameter),  The annual average is 3.3 hail days.

FLOODS:  Minor & moderate flooding occurred in Dumaresq Creek on 5th, 10th, 11th & 12th January, 23rd May, 14th, 15th & 16th June, 27th & 28th August, 29th September, 3rd October, 13th, 23rd, 24th, 25th & 27th November, 1st, 2nd, 8th & 11th December.
Major flooding occurred on 26th November.


LTA - Long Term Average     * Windy day - average wind speed higher than 20 kms per hour: 9am to 6pm      

 




             Weather Statistics 2011 - Armidale NSW


 

JAN

FEB

MAR

APR

MAY

JUN

JUL

AUG

SEP

OCT

NOV

DEC

YEAR

 

RAINFALL  mm

103.8

94.8

61.8

55.6

60.2

96.0

13.6

56.8

73.8

75.6

244.4

111.6

1048.0

   Long Term Average  mm

101.8

88.7

65.4

45.5

43.3

55.0

48.3

47.9

51.4

68.4

82.7

88.8

787.3

 

RAIN DAYS

9

10

17

14

10

13

7

17

7

10

10

14

138

   Long Term Average  days

10

10

10

8

8

10

9

9

8

9

9

10

110

 

HIGHEST DAILY RAINFALL  mm

23.2

40.0

14.2

22.0

32.2

28.4

5.2

16.6

28.8

19.6

87.6

31.2

87.6

   Day

6

8

5

16

23

15

18

28

29

15

24

23

 

AVERAGE DAILY MAX TEMP  deg C

26.2

26.2

22.8

19.2

15.1

12.3

12.1

14.6

17.8

18.8

24.2

20.7

19.2

   Long Term Average  deg C

26.4

25.4

23.4

20.0

16.3

13.1

12.4

14.1

17.5

20.5

22.6

25.0

19.7

 

AVERAGE DAILY MIN TEMP  deg C

13.8

13.6

11.7

7.0

0.6

0.9

-0.6

0.9

1.8

5.5

11.3

10.6

6.4

   Long Term Average  deg C

12.6

12.6

10.1

6.3

3.2

0.7

-0.3

-0.2

2.6

5.6

8.8

11.1

6.1

 

AVERAGE GRASS MIN TEMP  deg C

12.2

11.5

8.5

2.9

-3.2

-3.2

-4.8

-3.1

-2.7

1.7

7.9

8.5

3.0

   Long Term Average  deg C

9.6

10.0

7.2

3.3

-1.3

-2.9

-3.9

-4.1

-0.7

2.3

6.2

8.3

2.8

 

HIGHEST MAXIMUM TEMP  deg C

34.4

33.2

29.5

23.2

20.2

17.4

15.4

20.4

24.3

24.6

30.3

24.9

34.4

  Day

26

4

1

3

22

25

12,30

25

19

30

15

26

 

LOWEST MAXIMUM TEMP  deg C

16.4

17.7

18.0

15.6

8.0

7.8

7.2

9.1

8.1

9.0

16.7

14.0

7.2

   Day

6

22

5

17

30

9

19

18

9

2

24

7

 

HIGHEST MINIMUM TEMP  deg C

17.7

19.9

16.8

11.1

8.9

7.9

5.3

6.5

10.8

11.5

15.6

14.3

19.9

   Day

11

6

1

24

4

15

21

23

29

15

26

22

 

LOWEST MINIMUM TEMP  deg C

8.9

5.8

3.0

-0.9

-7.2

-5.0

-7.7

-4.9

-4.0

-0.8

4.1

6.5

-7.7

   Day

30

24

26

13

15

24

12

5

13

1

3

29

 

LOWEST GRASS MIN TEMP  deg C

6.1

3.8

-0.6

-3.4

-11.7

-9.8

-12.5

-9.3

-8.5

-5.1

0.0

2.5

-12.5

   Day

30

24

26

13

15

9

12

5

13

1

3

30

 

FROSTS

0

0

0

5

18

18

21

22

16

5

0

0

105

   Long Term Average  days

0

0

1

5

13

17

19

20

15

7

1

0

97

 

FOGS  days

1

2

1

2

5

3

2

9

1

4

0

4

34

   Long Term Average  days

1

1

3

5

5

4

3

2

2

2

1

1

32

 

THUNDERSTORMS  days

4

5

5

1

1

0

0

3

3

5

4

3

34

   Long Term Average  days

7

5

3

1

1

1

0

1

2

4

6

8

37

 

EVAPORATION  (Class A Pan)  mm

135.6

104.8

74.6

61.4

44.2

32.0

34.8

42.2

82.6

87.2

123.8

110.4

933.6

   Long Term Average  mm

162.5

127.7

116.4

77.2

51.0

37.4

42.4

65.9

96.1

127.4

134.5

160.5

1198.9

 

AVGE. DAILY EVAPORATION  mm

4.4

2.8

2.4

2.0

1.4

1.1

1.2

1.4

2.8

2.8

4.1

3.6

2.5

 

AVERAGE DAILY WIND RUN  km

131.9

107.2

104.3

104.8

93.1

150.2

141.9

104.3

137.2

108.7

117.4

131.3

119.4

   Long Term Average  km

156.9

151.8

146.5

131.4

129.4

150.7

158.2

172.1

177.9

163.7

158.9

159.4

154.7

 

PREVAILING 3PM WIND DIRECTION

E

W

E

E

SW

W

W

W

W

W

W

E

 -

 

FINE DAYS ^

14

12

5

12

12

13

13

11

22

12

13

6

145

   Long Term Average  days

16

13

17

17

15

14

15

19

19

18

14

16

192

 

MAXIMUM TEMP > 29.9 deg.   days

5

7

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

0

1

0

13

MAXIMUM TEMP < 10.0 deg.   days

0

0

0

0

2

3

4

3

2

1

0

0

15

MINIMUM TEMP < 5.0 deg.   days

0

0

1

7

27

22

27

25

24

15

1

0

149

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 ^  A fine day is a dry sunny day generally free from excessive cloud

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


       
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