Australian Region
Tropical Cyclone Tracking Maps

Cyclones are dangerous!

While it is true that some cyclones may do little more than generate strong gales and torrential rains, every year powerful cyclones bring destruction to some coastal communities in tropical regions, causing billions of dollars of damage to both public infrastructure and private dwellings, and costing many lives.

Before a cyclone approaches your area, ensure you read and understand the cyclone awareness information available from your local government authorities and/or any agency responsible for cyclone warnings in your area - for example the Surviving Cyclones brochure published by the Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BoM).

When a cyclone poses a threat to your area, listen to your local radio station and/or the visit the BoM website warnings page.

My Current Cyclone Information page also has links to warnings, maps, and satellite images of all current cyclones worldwide, however it can become out of date at times, so it is wise to check with the BoM if under a direct threat.

Winds around a tropical cyclone

A tropical cyclone is a more or less circular rotating storm system of tropical origin with gale force or stronger winds.

Cyclones vary greatly in extent, with the area effected by gale force or stronger winds ranging from small compact systems less than 100km (60 miles) in diameter to huge systems that may be more than 1000km (600 miles) in diameter.



The extent of a cyclone has no relationship to it's intensity - when Cyclone Tracy devastated Darwin in 1974 with winds of approx. 240 km/hr (150 mph) it was a very small compact system approx. 50km (30 miles) in diameter.

The actual centre of a cyclone is usually calm or nearly so, and this calm 'eye' area may be from less than 5km (3 miles) to more than 50km (30 miles) in diameter.

The most destructive winds are usually in a more or less circular ring around the centre called the 'eyewall', and this ring may be from a few kilometres (miles) to a few dozen kilometres (tens of miles) in width

The destructive hurricane force wind zone around a large cyclone may extend many dozens of kilometres (tens of miles) out from the centre, while storm force winds and gales may extend hundreds of kilometres (miles) out from the centre.

Depending on environmental circumstances, the shape of the wind field of a cyclone may vary from a well defined nearly circular system to a quite elongated system with gales or stronger winds extending many hundreds of kilometres (miles) in a particular direction - cyclone warnings may indicate this by giving wind strengths at different distances from the centre in particular quadrants or semi-circles if this is a significant issue.



You should note that if the eye of a cyclone passes over your location, the suddenly calm conditions will soon give way to destructive winds from a different direction, with the length of the period of calm lasting anywhere from a few minutes to several hours depending on the size of the eye, the speed of the forward motion of the cyclone, and how close the centre of the eye passes to your location.

 

 

Instructions and Information

 

Map Target Areas

In the southern hemisphere, tropical cyclones most often approach a particular location from the northern semicircle - i.e. anywhere from West through North to East - although they may occasionally approach from a little south of East or West, and it is rare indeed for one to approach from the South.

To give the best possible coverage for any location, each map is designed around a target area which may be considered as a rectangle below the centre of the map with at least 9° (approx. 1000km or 620 miles) West, North, and East and 4° (approx. 440km or 240 miles) South of any location within the target area, and in many cases there is some overlap, however some locations well inland may not be within a target area although you can still choose a suitable map for these places bearing in mind that cyclones approaching must have come from over the ocean.

Each target area has been asigned a name representing it to facilitate choosing a map appropiate for a particular location, and the target areas are also grouped within the area of responsibility of one of the three Australian Tropical Cyclone Warning Centres [TCWC] located in Brisbane, Darwin, and Perth.

 

Downloading Maps

To make downloading easy, the map headings and thumbnail images are each linked to the appropiate map.

Mac OS users

If veiwing thumbnail image or link: click and hold, choose "Download..." or "Download to Disk..." as appropiate to your browser from the pop-up menu.
If viewing full sized map image: click and hold, choose "Save Image As..." or "Download to Disk..." as appropiate to your browser from the pop-up menu.

Windows users

If veiwing thumbnail image or link: right-click and choose "Save Target As" from pop-up menu.
If veiwing full sized map image: right-click and choose "Save Picture As" from pop-up menu.

 

Plotting On The Maps

All maps are at a scale of 30 pixels per degree, and plotting dots are every 0.1° to enable easy plotting of cyclone positions as given in official Tropical Cyclone Warnings as issued by various agencies.

It should be noted that the actual position of the centre of the cyclone is only known this accurately when it has a well defined eye in satellite imagery or is within range of a radar ground station - in many cases there are uncertainties of perhaps a half degree, or even more at times.

The 0.1° positions as given by cyclone warning agencies are represented on the map as the square containing and to the lower right of the position as given in the warning. For example, if a cyclone position is given as "172.4E 16.3S" it would be located on the map as shown by the red block in the image below, also shown enlarged for clarity:

 

Printing results may vary depending on the quality of your printer and it's associated software.

If you notice any errors or broken links, or feel extra maps and/or locations need to be added, please email me: carls@qldnet.com.au.

 

 

Copyright & Contact

© Copyright 2005 C.B.Smith - All Rights Reserved.

Permission is hereby granted for non-commercial private users to download and print these maps for their own personal and private use.

Persons engaged in tracking cyclones for public safety reasons, such as employees of government departments or those involved in emergency services organisations and aid agencies, may also download and print these maps for the purpose of tracking cyclones, and may also utilise them via the media to raise public awareness of a potential threat - it is OK to add the name of your organisation and a small logo in these circumstances provided it does not obscure any part of the copyright notice.

Local councils and non-profit community groups in cyclone prone areas may download and print these maps for local public distribution provided the maps are not modified in any way and such distribution is free of charge.

Schools may use these maps for teaching cyclone awareness, and may also distribute them to students and parents in cyclone prone areas, provided the maps are not modified in any way and such distribution is free of charge.

Web sites, whether personal, government, or commercial, may display the thumbnail version of one or more of the maps to link to the full size map on this website provided appropiate source acknowledgement and copyright information are included with any such thumbnails, and that any such display does not appear as if the maps are being sponsered by or advertising any other product or service - you will find HTML code fragments suitable for embedding each of the thumbnail images here.

Commercial media organisations are prohibited from printing, displaying, or broadcasting the map images without the express permission of the copyright owner, except as is allowed above in the form of presentations in the public interest.

All other uses, such as reproducing and offering for sale or as part of any publication in any form offered for sale, use in advertising, or other purposes not covered above, are prohibited without the express permission of the copyright owner.

For more information contact Carl Smith by email: carls@qldnet.com.au

 

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Jon Gill, Services Policy Branch, Australian Bureau of Meteorology, for his valuable feedback on the contents of my website, and for sending me a list of place names used by the BoM in their official warnings. The information he provided has been most helpful in preparing the Australian Region Tropical Cyclone Tracking Maps.

Online Map Creation - the map coastlines are based on digital maps drawn by submitting requests to the map drawing page of the OMC website which uses "Generic Mapping Tools (GMT)" to draw your maps and load them into your browser.

Australian Geographic Place Names (Gazetteer) - many of the Australian map location coordinates were found in this Australian Government database.

GEMPAK Weather Station tables - the Meteorological Station coordinates for Willis Island, Queensland, and Giles, Western Australia, were found here.

 

Disclaimer

Whilst I have done my best to ensure these maps are accurate, there may be errors, and I am not in any way responsible for any specific use that may be made of the maps, nor am I liable for any damage that may result from their use or misuse. It is the responsibility of the end users to determine whether or not the maps are suitable for their purposes