2009 September rainfall – still ‘above average’?

Anyone looking at the final rainfall figures for Melbourne’s rainfall might be heartened by the news that the final result was about 10mm above the September average. Compared to last year’s disastrous result where we had about 12mm, it was over 50mm better. But I wonder if the final result, and the current ‘average’ isn’t still a little too high

Planning often requires that we look at our known information and then consider what we might do in the future. Too often however we extrapolate our existing beliefs onto next year, five years or even fifteen years from now and ‘plan’ as if there’ll be very little change. When it comes to rainfall in Australia, we have a pretty good track record of not getting it ‘accurate’ enough to be helpful. So a pause for thinking is suggested – although September 2009 had ‘above average’ rainfall, I’d like to suggest that we consider it to be a WELL above average rainfall result and then plan accordingly. There’s still too many people with a belief that things aren’t that urgent – after all, their taps still work. Maybe for some, it’s time their taps didn’t!