Melbourne, Australia set an all time record rainfall for a 24-hour period on the evening of the 2nd and morning of the 3rd of February 2005. The 120 mm (4.7 inches) of rain was the most since records began back in 1856, beating the previous record of 108 mm. An low-pressure center that intensified over Victoria was responsible for generating the storms, which spread gusty winds and heavy downpours across southeast Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania. The TRMM-based, near-real time Multi-satellite Precipitation Analysis (MPA) at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center monitors rainfall over the global Tropics. MPA rainfall totals for the period 1 to 3 February 2005 are shown for southeastern Australia. On the order of 2 to 3 inches of rain (green and yellow areas) are shown over the coastal range just north of Melbourne with locally heavier amounts of up to 4 inches (isolated red areas). The darker red areas along the east coast of New South Wales indicate areas of up 6 inches of rainfall, and up to 4 inches of rain is shown by the orange area over the northeast tip of Tasmania.

TRMM is a joint mission between NASA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).

Images produced by Hal Pierce (SSAI/NASA GSFC) and caption by Steve Lang (SSAI/NASA GSFC).