The daily weather log

October began fine and very warm, with 32° days and 17° nights. Wet days from the 4th to the 6th brought warm nights at first, followed by a very cold day (19.2°) and night (4.4°). From the 10th to the 21st normal temperatures prevailed. Then a strong southerly made days and nights 10° colder again. The night of the 23rd was 9.0° cooler than normal. The month was frost-free, however.
Calmer, sunny weather returned, with the last day the hottest, at 34.5°.
The seventh rain day of the month brought 52 mm. Rain drove in horizontally during a south-westerly gale after 5pm on Tuesday the fourteenth. This was reported, with a photo of broken trees, in the “Manilla Express” (21/10/08). The gale was a gustfront fanning out from the downburst of a thunderstorm. Storm gustfront gales in this area often blow from the south-west. Within minutes, cold air is dumped on the ground from a height of more than 5 kilometres. The downburst brings the strong south-west winds found there down to ground level.

 Comparing October months

Unlike last October, which was remarkably warm and had a high daily temperature range, this October had temperatures near normal, with rather warm nights bringing a lower daily temperature range. Both humidity and cloudiness were slightly above normal.

Manilla has had a lot of rain.
The high rainfall total, 97 mm, is on the 83rd percentile for October. Only 21 recorded Octobers were wetter, including October 1999 (104mm) and 2000 (110 mm). Most rainfall totals for several months together are now above the median (the 50th percentile). The total for 2 months (September and October) is in the 82nd percentile, 3 months in the 71st, 4 months in the 60th, 5 months in the 63rd, and 6 months in the 50th percentile. Rainfall totals for longer periods, up to 60 months, are above the median with only two exceptions: the totals for 9 months (42nd percentile) and for 30 months (35th percentile).

Data. Rainfall data is from Manilla Post Office, courtesy of Phil Pinch. Dew point values before August 2005 are from Tamworth Airport 6 am data supplied by the Bureau of Meteorology. Temperature and other data are from 3 Monash Street, Manilla.