Is Australia’s “drought of the century” easing? What does the future hold for the parched continent “down under”?
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ustralia suffers worst drought in 1,000 years…” “Drought tightens grip on Australia…” “Australia’s epic drought: The situation is grim…” These headlines grabbed the world’s attention in 2006 and 2007, as Australians suffered under the weight of one of the most severe droughts on record. Thankfully, the year 2008 began with much-needed precipitation. But is the increased rainfall a sign of more good things to come? Or was it just a brief respite? Is the “Big Dry,” as the drought of the last six years has been called, part of a normal climatic cycle, or are the weather patterns of Australia changing? “Murray-Darling drought may be permanent,” was the May 9, 2008 headline on a Sydney NewsHerald story. “There is no end in sight to the drought,” the article warned. And “it could become worse next year.” The Murray-Darling Basin covers much of eastern Australia, stretching from southern Queensland through New South Wales and Victoria and into South Australia. For the first time in recorded history, the water level of some lakes in the region has plunged to below sea level. Even after “good summer rains,” the National Climate Centre at Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology reports the rains “barely made a dent” in the drought. Australians are no strangers to drought. In fact, Australia is the world’s driest inhabited continent. Naturalist Charles Darwin wrote of the link he observed between Australia’s dry temperatures and the resulting fires during his visit in January 1836: “In the whole country I scarcely saw a place without
the marks of fire; whether these had been more or less recent—whether the stumps were more or less black, was the greatest change, which varied the uniformity, so wearisome to the traveller’s eye” (Voyage of the Beagle, p. 324). In her 1911 anthology, The Closed Door, Australian poet Dorothea Mackellar summed up the harsh but endearing climate of her beloved Australia in her famous poem, “My Country”: “I love a sunburnt country, a land of sweeping plains, of ragged mountain ranges, of droughts and flooding rains. I love her far horizons, I love her jewel-sea, her beauty and her terror—the wide brown land for me!”
Drought: A Way of Life Australians have come to expect drought as a way of life. Typically, three years out of every ten bring decreased rainfall and parched conditions. This regular cycle is also punctuated by occasional droughts of greater severity. Drought is so common in Australia that some experts suggest removing the word “drought” from any discussion about Australian climate, preferring to think of the swings of precipitation and temperature as normal fluctuations instead of unusual and unexpected events. This approach is reflected in Australian government policy; authors Linda Botterill and Melanie Fisher point out that learning to live with drought means essentially learning what it “means to be Australian” (Beyond Drought: People, Policy, and Perspectives, p. ix). Why does Australia’s climate vary so widely? One major factor is the regular patterns of the Southern
Oscillation—a climate pattern that varies between El Niño climate events in which the warming ocean brings higher temperatures and less rain, and La Niña climate events in which the cooling ocean brings storms and increased rainfall, particularly to eastern Australia.
Is the “Big Dry” Different? With such a history of drought, have Australia’s recent drought conditions been any different? Yes, they have. As the Australian Bureau of Statistics noted, the 2002–2003 drought was in some ways unique and unusually severe for two reasons—it was accompanied by record high average maximum temperatures, and it affected virtually the entire continent (Yearbook Australia 2006, “Australia’s Climate”). Drought conditions were persisting through the 2006–2007 growing season, when the MurrayDarling River Basin, which produces 40 percent of Australia’s agricultural output, was at its driest in 116 years. Writing in Science News, reporter Emily Sohn noted, “The Australian continent has experienced dry spells since ancient times, but the length and severity of the current crisis have surprised even the most weathered climate experts ” (“The Big Dry,” October 27, 2007). Even after welcome rains in December 2007, Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology reported that “the worst of the long-term deficiencies are likely to remain for some time” (“Drought Statement,” January 7, 2008). Scientists agree that climate change in Australia is occurring faster than expected, and some are
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