GOULBURN is a town, to the southwest of Sydney, known for its maximum-security prison. It is also a place, that by Australian standards gets quite cold. Temperatures have been measured at the airport since 1988, and the lowest temperature ever record in July is officially -9.1 degrees Celsius.
In fact, Sunday morning this record was smashed!
It got down to -10.4 degrees Celsius, at 6.17am on Sunday 2nd July. This was the official Bureau recording for Goulburn.
The observation sheet shows a minimum of -10.4, this temperature is recorded every second and downloaded every minute. The lowest value recorded becomes the minimum for the day. Except the Bureau has not recorded this value as the minimum.
Except, the Bureau has since erased this measurement.
According to the Bureau's own rules, the coldest temperature record during a 24-hour period to 9am is recorded as the minimum for that day. So, for Sunday 2 July the carry-over minimum should be -10.4 degrees Celsius. But instead the summary documentation shows -10.0. There is now no public record of -10.4 degrees Celsius.
The summary for Goulburn for Sunday 2 July 2017 incorrectly shows the minimum as -10.0 degree Celsius. It would be inconsistent with global warming theory for the current record to be smashed by a whole 1.3 degree Celsius. So, the Bureau homogenise the temperature record, changing the actual measurement to something more consistent with their perception of how reality should be - with what temperature should be.
I would have the managers at the Bureau put in the Goulburn jail.
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Update 9pm Tuesday evening
So, the Bureau has now acknowledged that it really was -10.4 degree Celsius at Goulburn on Sunday morning, and corrected the 'Daily Weather Observations' page for Goulburn.
By Tuesday evening this 'Daily Observations' sheet had been corrected, now showing -10.4 degree Celsius for Goulburn on Sunday morning.
However, the Bureau has so far not updated the key CDO Online database, the official record of temperatures for Goulburn airport. This is the dataset used to calculate regional, national and global temperatures. Rather than replace the bogus -10.0 degree Celsius with the correct -10.4, they are leaving a blank. Not good enough.
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Update 6am Tuesday 10 July
The following screenshot is provided as further evidence that the Bureau's 'quality control' changed the actual reading of -10.4, to -10.0 which was then entered into the CDO database. After protests the -10.0 value was removed and no reading recorded. After more protests, the correct value of -10.4 was inserted. This is unprecedented.
In this screenshot, taken on the morning of Tuesday 4 July, the bogus value of -10.0 has been entered into the CDO database.
It was not until two days later that the correct value was inserted, as shown in the following screen shot - taken this morning.
What a story! Somebody decided a priori what the possible temperature range can be, causing a warming bias. And, the good part is, we have no idea how often these biases have been active and since when. They are opaque.
[…] Jo Nova Jennifer Marohasy […]
It would have been nice to see a copy of the response from the BOM. I understand they actually posted about the -10.4C figure on Twitter that morning, highlighting how unusually cold it was. Not much of a cover up.
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Hi Harry
I've quoted some of the response in my article just now published by The Spectator here: https://spectator.com.au/2017/07/price-of-electricity-is-rising-not-sure-about-temperatures/
Cheers, Jennifer
The tinfoil is worn by the reactionary climate true believers. Ignorant dismissal of skepticics is one of their main means of expression.
Jennifer.
You are making one assumption after another and not showing any evidence that you are correct. But I do understand you run a Conspiracy Theory blog, so be it - I do not expect you to have high standards despite the fact you are expecting high standards from the BOM.
Did you or the journalist have a copy of the response from the BOM? I am interested in that.
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I do have a copy of the response from the Bureau. It states that when a temperature at Goulburn is recorded as less than -10.0 degree, it is corrected to -10.0 degree. Jennifer
Don and Harry
You are in error.
The value of -10.0 went through and was inserted into the CDO online database. So, quality control resulted in the correct value of -10.4 being deleted, and replaced with the value of -10.0.
This error was not corrected until a journalist pressed the Bureau for an explanation.
If you would like me to post more screenshots, to show the -10.0 showing at the CDO dataset... let me know.
Cheers, Jennifer
I've seen this type of "error" before and I think this is a fault in BOM procedures, not anything sinister. It's possibly to do with the the fact that "live" data is published for individual stations at half hourly intervals. When station downloads are complete, there would be Tmax and Tmin figures in the record, requiring an update.
PS: Australian temperature records are in an appalling state but i think this one is explainable.