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Factors including the circulation pattern and antecedent conditions contributed to 2018 northeast Australian fires. High background temperatures also played a role for which model evidence suggests an anthropogenic influence. EVENT [...]

Introduction. The 2016 global coral bleaching event was severe: 93% of the northern, 700km stretch, of the Australian Great Barrier Reef (GBR) coral was bleached and by June, >60% of [...]

Rapid extreme event attribution and communication of results through gray literature provide useful information for stakeholders and the public but warrant further community discussion regarding how to mitigate potential risks. [...]

The term 'new normal' has been used in scientific literature and public commentary to contextualize contemporary climate events as an indicator of a changing climate due to enhanced greenhouse warming. [...]

Knowledge of the range of precipitation variability and extremes is restricted in regions such as Australia, where instrumental records are short and paleoclimatic records are limited in spatial and temporal extent and resolution. In such comparatively data-poor regions, there is limited context for understanding the statistical unusualness of recently observed extreme events, such as heavy rain and drought, and the influence of stochastic and anthropogenic forcings on their magnitude. This study attempts to further understandings of the range of forced and unforced variability using CMIP5 climate models. Focusing on extremes in the magnitude of monthly, seasonal, and annual precipitation, the distribution of instrumental-period observed precipitation in various Australian regions is compared to simulated precipitation in historical experiments as well as various long experiment (preindustrial control and Last Millennium) and anthropogenically forced simulations of the twenty-first century (RCP2.6 and RCP8.5). There is no systematic increase in the magnitude of simulated extremes corresponding to the length of model simulations, although many realizations reveal higher magnitude extremes compared to those observed, suggesting that the duration of the instrumental record may not capture the potential severity of stochastically driven extremes. A coherent increase in both wet and dry extremes is simulated throughout Australian regions in high greenhouse gas emissions scenarios, demonstrating a forced hydrological response. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on impact of human activity on heat waves experienced in summer 2012/13 in Australia, which experienced its hottest month in January 2013 when temperature reached 36.9 degrees Celsius. Topics discussed include the results of the investigation that made use of the Community Earth System Model's preindustrial control, historical and RCP8.5 experiments, including the rapid increase in high heat wave frequency anomaly in summer 2012/13.

The article focuses on human being's contribution to the extreme temperature recorded in Australia in 2013, when annual temperature exceeded the 1911-40 mean by 1.53 degrees Celsius. Topics discussed include results of their simulation that proved achieving such a temperature is very impossible due to naturally forced climate variability, findings of former studies that showed man's contribution to extreme temperatures and the probability of spring and September Tmean anomalies.

The article discusses whether anthropogenic effects on the climate have affected the relationship between the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and extreme rainfall in southeastern Australia in 2011 to 2012. Figures show that total and extreme rainfall were above average in the austral warm seasons across the region. The greater effect of the magnitude of anomalously cool sea surface temperatures (SST) is also compared to the magnitude of anomalously warm SSTs.