Australians sweat out warmest winter

Alice Springs has recorded its hottest August temperatures in almost three decades, topping 35C on the 22nd. Photo / Getty Images

SYDNEY - Australia is in the throes of probably its warmest winter ever, with records smashed up and down the country.

Lying awake at night in pools of sweat, Australians have been wondering which hemisphere they live in.

Now the Bureau of Meteorology has confirmed that this is set to be the hottest August on record, by a big margin - and, if forecasts for the next few days are correct, the hottest winter.

The bureau, which spends much of its time dampening speculation that weather patterns have changed, issued a "special climate statement" describing the heatwave as "highly abnormal".

It blamed hot air accumulating over central Australia during the past two or three weeks, without southerly fronts arriving to blow it away, as would usually be expected.

Nearly a dozen towns have broken winter records by more than four or five degrees, while some coastal areas of northern New South Wales and southern Queensland experienced their warmest day of 2009 in August, surpassing the midsummer temperatures of January and February.

The NSW town of Mungindi, near Moree, set an August record of 36.3C on Monday - only to break it the next day, when it reached 37.8C.

Benchmarks have been set for August lows, too, with the overnight temperature remaining at or above 23.3C in Lismore on Tuesday night. That was three degrees higher than the previous record for a night-time low in the NSW town.

The bureau is forecasting that spring will be warmer than average, especially in northwest Australia, and drier than normal, particularly in the south and east.

In coastal NSW and Queensland, people have been flocking to beaches and swimming pools.

The hot weather has also helped to precipitate an early start to the bushfire season, with dozens of fires burning across the two states. Scientists are warning eastern and southern states to brace themselves for high temperatures and an extreme bushfire risk this summer.

Brisbane had its warmest winter day ever on Monday, with the thermometer tipping 35.4C.

Sea surface temperatures, meanwhile, are nearly a degree above average, despite the El Nino effect.

Dr Blair Trewin, of the bureau's National Climate Centre, said the central and eastern Pacific would normally be warm, with cool waters closer to Australia.

"On this occasion, it is warm pretty well right across the Pacific. That is quite an unusual combination."

Trewin said the warm winter would almost certainly enter the record books in NSW and South Australia, and possibly in Victoria and Tasmania, too.

The national record is also likely to be broken by the time August ends. Nationally, winter temperatures have been more than 1.6C above average, while August has been more than three degrees higher than normal.

Farmers, already suffering the effects of prolonged drought in southern Australia, are disheartened by the forecast of more hot, dry weather to come.