A delayed wet season has helped Darwin experience one of its warmest starts to a year on record.

The opening days and nights of 2024 have been stifling in Darwin thanks to a combination of abnormally high temperatures and ample humidity.

The temperature at Darwin Airport on the morning of Monday, January 1, only dropped to 29.9ºC. This was the city’s hottest January morning since 1933 and its third highest January minimum temperature on record.

This sultry morning was then followed by daytime maximums of 35.3ºC on Monday and 35.6ºC Tuesday, making this the hottest first two days of a year since 1935. Tuesday was also Darwin’s hottest January day in eight years.

While a couple of 35ºC days may not seem exceptionally hot for higher latitudes in Australia, this type of heat can be oppressive when combined with Darwin’s high humidity at this time of year.

Dew point temperatures in the mid-to-high twenties made it feel about 3 to 6ºC warmer than it actually was for most of Monday and Tuesday in Darwin. At 1:30pm local time on Monday, an air temperature of 34.8ºC and a dew point of 27.5ºC made it feel more like 40ºC in the city.

One reason Darwin has been so warm in recent days has been the absence of cooling monsoonal wind and rain. While the average date of the monsoon onset in Darwin is during the final week of December, El Niño is known to delay the monsoon, and this has been the case this season.

Showers and thunderstorms will be possible in Darwin every day this week. However, with no clear signs of the monsoon on the horizon, the hot and sweaty build-up looks set to continue for until at least the middle of January.