Australian Weather Calendar 2010
The Bureau of Meteorology in Australia runs a photographic competition each year. The winning pictures go into a calendar, alongside their stories. Here are the pictures in the 2010 calendar, available to buy here. The theme was: Oceans, linking earth and atmosphere
Aurora australis (the Southern Lights) over Casey station, Antarctica, 28 June 2008, 11.27pm
Todor Iolovski quit his job as an electronics engineer for the adventure of a 14-month Antarctic posting as a Bureau of Meteorology Technical Officer (Engineering) at Australia’s Casey Station. In June 2008, on a clear, windless night at about midnight, Todor’s 30-year passion for photography enabled him to endure two hours outdoors at minus 20 degrees to take 10 long-exposure photographs. His picture of the Aurora australis was an exposure of 3 minutes 40 seconds, which also captured star trails as the earth turned
Rain falls at sunset on Paroo Station, Meekatharra, Western Australia, 1 April 2007, 6.15pm
Louise Ford is a keen photographer and pastoralist on Paroo Station, near Meekatharra, central Western Australia, where she and husband Jim run 1000 cattle on 200,000 hectares. The thunderstorm that contributed useful rain to their property in April 2007 — “we usually need a good, soaking rain,” she says — excited Louise. She rushed to the back of the homestead and photographed the storm as the sun set
Lightning over Moana Beach, south of Adelaide, 6 December 2005, 1.14am
John McDermott, an opal miner, artist and keen photographer, was caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. In December 2005, in the middle of the night, John was standing knee-deep in the shallows at Moana Beach, south of Adelaide, photographing lightning and its reflection in the water. “Suddenly I felt an electric charge in my hair,” he recalls, “and the tripod was resonating with a bit of a hum like a transformer.” He quickly splashed to dry land, and now vows: “I’ll only do that once!”
A storm front approaches yachts anchored at Rushcutters Bay, Sydney, 7 August 2008
Terry Ross, a former current affairs cameraman, now enjoys a less stressful life as a real estate photographer. But urgency was the order of the day mid-afternoon in August 2008 when he glimpsed storm clouds rolling over Sydney harbour — “huge, like a big cigar”, he says. Terry sped to Rushcutters Bay, possibly ignoring a number of road rules
Australian Weather Calendar 2010
Mammatus cloud associated with cumulonimbus over Derby airport, northwest Western Australia, at sunset, 9 December 2004, 6 pm
Mammatus cloud over Derby airport, northwest Western Australia, 9 December 2004, 6pm
Few people know Western Australia’s vast landscapes as well as Tony Robinson. For seven years he was a pilot with the Royal Flying Doctor Service, operating out of Port Hedland and Carnarvon. Late one afternoon in December 2004 thunderstorm clouds appeared over Derby airport in northwest WA. The mammatus clouds, associated with a deepening trough or front, loomed briefly “out of nowhere” from the base of the storm cloud directly over the small terminal
A thunderstorm front approaches New Brighton Beach, 30 December 2008, 4.03pm
Kathryn Lynch’s family knows she will drop everything and be out the door with her camera when dramatic weather looms. Kathryn was holidaying near Byron Bay in December 2008, when conditions became very hot and still mid-afternoon. “Then a terrific wind whipped things along the beach as the tail-end of the storm came over,” she says. “I kept on shooting, shielding the camera between shots; and the cricketers also played on.”
A rainbow over Victoria Dock and Sullivan’s Cove, Hobart, 23 February 2008, 4.55pm
Web designer Jamie Scuglia enjoys his holidays around Australia, camera always on standby. In February 2008, Jamie was ensconced in a Hobart hotel and by late afternoon was glum about the less-than-summery water view. But the room turned out to be the right place at the right time as the sun came out during a rain shower and fashioned a rainbow over Victoria Dock and Sullivan’s Cove alongside the Derwent River
Sun shines through dense smoke over Mt Lindsay, Western Australia, April 2004
Kade Bouwman always keeps his camera nearby when he operates earthmoving equipment around Denmark, near Albany, in southwest Western Australia. His enthusiasm paid off in April 2004 when he watched helicopters drop a ring of fire bombs into forest near Mt Lindsay for a fuel reduction burn. “Soon there was a circle of fire — and whoof, suddenly the updraught drew flames into the middle, and up she went, spectacularly but briefly"
Sea fog blows over Newport Beach, north of Sydney, 18 November 2004
Professional photographer John Grainger frequently pursues weather phenomena around Sydney. In November 2004, he caught a glimpse of fog coming in from the sea. Hoping the sea fog would linger, he drove to the northern beaches. At Newport Beach and waited for the fog to thin a little to reveal glimpses of buildings, bathers and Norfolk Island pines
Floodwaters move through Ourdel Station, Queensland, February 2008
Happiness is being belted into a small helicopter without a door and leaning out to photograph a vast southwest Queensland landscape under water. Cyclonic rains had transformed the state’s Channel Country in February 2008 for only the fifth time in the past 30 years, and local school principal and station owner Helen Commens was there to record it
Clouds over Port Phillip Bay, Victoria, as seen from Arthurs Seat, 2.30pm, August 2007
Some pictures simply demand to be taken, says Ben Albrecht, owner of a jewellery gallery in Melbourne. Ben had just enjoyed lunch with his wife’s family at a Mornington Peninsula vineyard when they stopped at Arthurs Seat. “It was an amazing day (in August 2007), blue as blue, with two cloud layers,” Ben recalls. “So still, with only one boat visible”
Clouds over Clonbinane, central Victoria, 7 November 2007, 6.25pm
Educational consultant Ross Kimber is a keen photographer and takes his camera everywhere. He was returning to Melbourne on the Hume Freeway in November 2007 when he spotted a storm near Clonbinane as the sun was setting. “I loved the light on the paddocks; the impending drama,” he recalls
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