Posted on 10/11/2012 4:28:05 PM PDT by BlackVeil
Snow has fallen across a large part of NSW and the ACT, despite it being over a month into spring.
There have been reports of snow in the Blue Mountains and Southern Highlands, while Canberra has received 10 centimetres.
Yesterday, South Australia witnessed a once-in-a-century October snowfall.
Sydney Ferries has cancelled the Manly service due to the weather, and the Great Western Highway is closed in both directions at Wentworth Falls.
Scroll down to the bottom of the page for photos and reports of the snowfall from ABC listeners.
The Bureau of Meteorology says the snow is a result of a very cold air mass that has moved across NSW. The air mass has caused a deep low to form on the south coast which has produced the snow.
Bureau forecaster Ewen Mitchell says although the snowfall is unusual, it is not unheard of at this time of year.
"I don't think there's been hugely heavy falls. [It's been] fairly widespread," he said. "It's certainly not record breaking in terms that it's happened before."
...Katoomba resident Dawn told ABC 702 Sydney she woke to a white world.
"It's very beautiful and peaceful," she said.
Dangerous roads
Police and inspectors from Roads and Maritime New South Wales are inspecting the New England Highway after heavy snowfalls in the Northern Tablelands overnight. ...
(Excerpt) Read more at abc.net.au ...
Canberra is somewhat close to the only place it regularly snows in the Australian winter. The appropriately named Snowy Mountains. Nevertheless I am not sure. The ACT mentioned in the article stands for Australian Capitol Territory and includes Canberra so they did get snow in this time.
In the early days of European settlement, when Australia was settled by military personnel and convicts and everybody was dependent on the government for supplies, both soldiers and convicts were issued with new clothing where necessary on the 1st day of each month. They had two uniforms - summer and winter. By the 1st December, temperatures in the area around Sydney (the first settlement) were already extremely warm - too warm to safely wear winter uniform, so that became the date that summer uniform was issued. Our mild (by European standards) winter meant that issuing winter uniform six months later at the start of June, didn't cause problems (while it can start getting cold in April and May, it's still not bad compared to Europe), and so that was what was done. Over time, these dates became the official start dates for summer and winter for all government purposes and we wound up with four seasons of three calendar months each.
It doesn't work perfectly - March, which is officially part of Autumn is often a very hot month, but it's what we've wound up with.
OK, so THAT's what I was wondering. The government (and therefore the general populace, I suppose) has adopted their own seasonal start dates of Sept 1, Dec 1, etc.
So, by that calendar, they are over a month into spring.
You learn something every day. Thanks for your explanation.
Although I've never been there during their winter my limited experience at other times of the year is that the climate is pretty mild...certainly when compared to the winters of Minnesota or even parts of Georgia,for example.The one exception to that "moderate weather" observation that I experienced was a visit to the "outback" in early March.My God was it hot!
Because in the Southern Hemisphere we manage to be punctual and start our seasons on the first day of the month, not three weeks later.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.