The frequency of hailstorms has increased by about 40% around Sydney and Perth over the last four decades, while hail activity has decreased across much of the rest of the country, new research has found.
Scientists from the University of New South Wales and the Bureau of Meteorology analysed trends between 1979 and 2021, finding that hail-prone conditions had increased significantly over Australia’s south-east and south-west.
“This is the first time we’ve had a clear picture of how the hail climate across Australia is changing,” said the study co-author Dr Joshua Soderholm, a radar research scientist at the BoM.
The study’s first author, Dr Tim Raupach of the Climate Change Research Centre, said increases in hail frequency over Sydney, Canberra and Perth were mostly driven by atmospheric instability, which is determined by temperature and moisture.
Previous research, co-authored by Raupach, has found that hailstorm frequency is generally expected to increase in Australia with climate change.
“One of the reasons that we’re interested in doing this research is to provide the information that could help with increasing resilience, whether that’s in cities where the materials that we build structures out of have an effect on how much damage you get from a hailstorm, or agricultural regions where farmers need to decide which crops to plant,” he said.
The original article contains 652 words, the summary contains 216 words. Saved 67%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The frequency of hailstorms has increased by about 40% around Sydney and Perth over the last four decades, while hail activity has decreased across much of the rest of the country, new research has found.
Scientists from the University of New South Wales and the Bureau of Meteorology analysed trends between 1979 and 2021, finding that hail-prone conditions had increased significantly over Australia’s south-east and south-west.
“This is the first time we’ve had a clear picture of how the hail climate across Australia is changing,” said the study co-author Dr Joshua Soderholm, a radar research scientist at the BoM.
The study’s first author, Dr Tim Raupach of the Climate Change Research Centre, said increases in hail frequency over Sydney, Canberra and Perth were mostly driven by atmospheric instability, which is determined by temperature and moisture.
Previous research, co-authored by Raupach, has found that hailstorm frequency is generally expected to increase in Australia with climate change.
“One of the reasons that we’re interested in doing this research is to provide the information that could help with increasing resilience, whether that’s in cities where the materials that we build structures out of have an effect on how much damage you get from a hailstorm, or agricultural regions where farmers need to decide which crops to plant,” he said.
The original article contains 652 words, the summary contains 216 words. Saved 67%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!