Identifying East Coast Lows with climate hazards on the eastern seaboard

Abstract

East Coast Lows are an important weather system that can produce severe wind, wave and rainfall events along the eastern seaboard of Australia. While a num- ber of databases of these systems have been produced, this information has his- torically not been readily accessible to potential users outside the research sec- tor. This paper details the development of a new product, Maps and Tables of Climate Hazards on the Eastern Seaboard (MATCHES), that bridges this gap. It combines a new database of East Coast Lows with weather impacts across the eastern seaboard. Through use of user-defined impacts thresholds and an intui- tive front-end interface, this new tool provides an easy way to link East Coast Lows with their weather impacts.