🇦🇺Australia

Australia stretches from 11°S to 43°S, encompassing nearly every major Köppen climate type on the world's flattest and driest inhabited continent. The subtropical ridge drives extreme aridity across the interior — the Great Sandy, Gibson, Simpson, and Great Victoria deserts all receive under 250 mm annually, and the endorheic Lake Eyre basin remains dry most years.

A semi-arid transition ring surrounds the desert core, giving way to tropical monsoon climates (Aw/Am) in the far north where Darwin exceeds 1,700 mm in the November–April wet season, Mediterranean zones (Csa) around Perth and Adelaide with 700 mm of winter rainfall, humid subtropical (Cfa) conditions along the east coast from Brisbane to Sydney (~1,200 mm year-round), cool oceanic (Cfb) climates in Tasmania where the west coast tops 2,400 mm, and alpine (ETH) pockets in the Snowy Mountains.

Rainfall extremes define the continent: Mt Bellenden Ker in northeastern Queensland recorded over 12,000 mm in its wettest year, while vast interior tracts receive below 200 mm. The Outback regularly sees summer maxima above 40°C — Marble Bar endured 160 consecutive days above 37.8°C in 1923–24. Major bushfires have marked the landscape, notably Black Saturday in February 2009 and the Black Summer season of 2019–20.

ENSO oscillations control much of the interannual variability: El Niño events bring drought to the east, La Niña episodes trigger widespread flooding, and tropical cyclones affect the northern coast from November to April. The subtropical ridge reinforces the continent's dry character and concentrates population along the better-watered coastal fringes.

Our archive covers 3 Australian cities with daily ERA5 reanalysis data going back to 1940. The warmest July averages occur in Brisbane, around 19.9°C, while Melbourne records the coldest January nights near 14.5°C. Comparing the last decade against the 1940–1970 baseline, mean temperatures across these cities have risen by about 0.9°C.