Beautiful outside today!

[Kyorisu]

Eastern Australia is almost entirely in a heatwave, although the poor Victorians are bearing the brunt of it atm.

Bah to your heatwave I'm glad the I don't have to put up with it anymore. A fortnight of high 30s and the first week in the 40s. Urgh.

 

[Jintor]

It sounds to me like the entire state of Victoria is actually on fire. 66 Dead and counting. It's worse than Ash Wednesday.

 

[Sparta]

Victoria is having some of the worst fires in recorded history down here. 66 Confirmed dead with some sources reporting 74 dead. The death toll is expected to rise to 100. Brian Naylor, who used to be the face of Channel 9 news for 20 years is missing, and his wife has been found dead.

The conditions are said to be worse than the Ash Wednesday fires and to put into perspective how horrific the Ash Wednesday fires were:

The freakish conditions spawned unique effects: a car was forced 90m along a road with its handbrake on, burning mattresses were seen hurtling through the air, steaks were cooked well-done in deep freezers, road surfaces bubbled and caught fire and sand liquefied to glass.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ash_Wednesday_fires

Apparently they are finding groups of burnt out cars bunched together on the highways . People are presuming the heat generated from the fire is actually killing them first before the fire or smoke even comes close. Some people have reported seeing fires travelling faster than cars on open highways. Others have said that it took about 5-6 minutes from the first smell of smoke to having your house consumed in flames 30 feet tall. Its the combination of the extreme heat (47 degrees Celsius, the hottest ever day in Melbourne, the winds of over 100 km/h, the drought and the eucalyptus gases from the trees thats causing everything to go up so quickly and propel embers massive distances.

The media loves to sensationalise things like this and say that looking at these bushfires looks like the world ending. When seeing things like this its hard to disagree.

 

[Avoidist]

It was so hot here that people were dying from heat alone:

After the temperature topped out at a near-record 45.8C on Wednesday, January 28, the overnight minimum was 33.9C, the highest such temperature recorded.

...Up to 80 sudden deaths have been reported in Adelaide since the heatwave erupted on Australia Day.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25019866-5006787,00.html

It's a miracle we didn't have any fires here. Seriously sucks for those states that did.

 

[nurizeko]

It's absolutely gorgeous today. In the upper 60's. (F) Lately around here it's been below 5 degrees (F) and this is a very VERY welcome change. I hope it stays like this all weekend.

Anyone else dead sick of winter? Roll on spring!

Actually I like winter, at least for a short while. We don't really get winter often anymore, just a soggy couple of months then summer, yawn, and this is the UK...

 

[Adabiviak]

We need more wet weather here in central California. It snowed up a bit past my house yesterday, got some chilly rain here. Not enough to recharge the watershed. The wife and I may go snowboarding tomorrow.

 

[cleverendeavouR]

And also my car is so frozen that it wont start!

That happened to me a few days ago!


I was so excited to go out yesterday and today without a coat. It's just there's mud everywhere from all the snow now.

 

[Sheepo]

I'm wearing shorts everybody!