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 The cold airmass
that has gradually pushed heatwave conditions off the continent produced widespread
and damaging frost-level temperatures across SE SA and most of NSW and VIC this
morning. With light winds and clear skies, minima were 6 to 11 below average,
with Kosciuszko Chalet at Charlotte
Pass recording
a low of -15.0 and nearby Perisher Valley setting a new September record for
the station with a minimum of -12.5. Kerang in NW VIC also set a record with
a low of 0.0, its coldest September morning in 40 years of record. Some light
showers in the east overnight fell as snow at Omeo in VIC and Tidbinbilla in
the ACT.
In the NSW Upper Hunter Valley, the late severe frosts wreaked havoc in some
vineyards, though the damage appears to be patchy. One Denman grower reported
80% of his chardonnay crop ruined as a result of frost burning tender young
shoots. The same patchy damage also affected chardonnay crops in the SA Riverland
near Renmark, while vineyards around Orange NSW were also affected.
The frosts in the Central West of NSW took a heavy toll on canola crops. Col
Mullin, District Agronomist at the Dubbo Department of Agriculture, told ABC
Radio that the
frost came at the worst possible time as the canola was going to seed. "Certainly
from Parkes, Peak Hill, Tomingley, back up through Dubbo, Narromine, Wellington
up to Gilgandra, there are some growers who have lost 100 per cent of
their canola crops, others have lost a percentage and that's going to vary
depending on how low
the area was and that sort of thing," he said. "In fact, the severity
of that frost was quite late in the season for us. Normally we don't get too
many frosts after the middle of September, they
can do a lot of damage to crops like canola."
In VIC, Goulburn and Murray Valley orchardists have seen this season's apricot
crop devastated by frosts this morning. Some growers have had their
entire
crops of early apricots blackened, while there has also been damage to persimmons,
peaches and plums. The Northern Victorian Fruitgrowers Association subsequently
estimated that $15m in damage had been done.
 Over
1,000 firefighters in NSW took advantage of calmer, cooler weather today to
contain and backburn around the 75 fires still burning in the state. Six have
been declared emergencies, and 12 on the Northern Tablelands which have been
burning for two weeks continue to cause most concern because of their size
and difficulty of containment. A major fire on the eastern side of the Comboyne
Plateau southwest of Port Macquarie burnt through hundreds of hectares of state
forest
today, closing the Kew-Lorne-Comboyne Road.
Sources: ABC, Shepparton News, AAP, Port Macquarie News |
