Earlier this week, a cut-off low pressure remained stationary over the South Coast of NSW, delivering heavy rainfalls to East Gippsland and from Eden to Narooma.
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To date, Merimbula has received 285mm so far this month, breaking the wettest ever May of 1974, when 279.7mm fell.
There were two separate heavy daily rainfalls in Bega. The first one, on May 5, was the heaviest daily fall for May since 1963. The second, a week later, a heavier daily fall was the heaviest since 1956.
It is unusual to get two days of over 100mm during May in Bega in the same year. The last time this happened was back in 1956.
Both Merimbula and Bega had a very wet March this year, followed by a rather dry April before the heavy rain this month.
There was a similar rainfall distribution in both 1978 and 1983 and this did lead to well above normal rainfall for the rest of those two years in North East Victoria.
In East Gippsland, Orbost has to date received 135mm - its highest total in May since 1983.
Orbost, too, has had a very wet March, then a dry April, followed by a wet May.
There were five past occasions dating back to 1883 when this rainfall distribution occurred in Orbost. These were in 1911, 1913, 1956, 1961 and 1970. All led to over 1000mm for the year at Orbost and nearby towns in East Gippsland, except 1913, which was slightly wetter.
Four of those years led to a wet year in North East Victoria, except 1961, which was a relatively dry due mainly to a high frequency of cut-off lows and East Coast Lows in the Tasman Sea, near Gabo Island, where sea surface temperatures during 1961 were at the highest level since 1890 with 17.65 degrees and did not rise above this value annually until 1973.
Last month, Corowa recorded its driest April since 1911 and up at Cairns, it was the wettest April since 1911. May and June 1911 was wetter than average here but the rest of 1911 was rather dry. Late in November 1911, there was a heatwave, the City of Melbourne recorded 40.7 - the second hottest November day on record.
Last Monday's (May 10) cold change brought only patchy rainfalls. Warrenbayne recorded 31mm, while Wangaratta recorded 12.4mm.
The official gauge at Benalla Airport recorded no rain again. In fact, there has been no rain there for 30 successive days.
The area of well above normal sea surface temperatures has increased in size in the Indian Ocean west of Western Australia and also just south of Tasmania and to some extent near Gabo Island.
A series of cold fronts are currently approaching in a WSW airstream but will only bring showery falls.
The City of Melbourne looks set to record above average rainfall this month, for the fourth successive May.
A more significant rainfall is anticipated about May 24 in the Albury-Wodonga region.
