AFTER such an extended period of severe drought, forecasters tend to "clutch at straws" and look for any signs - no matter how insignificant - that there could be rain around.
However, a semi-stationary trough line fed by moisture from the tropics for the first time this season is bringing some rain to eastern Australia and because it is slow moving, it will continue to do so for a few days into next week.
A lot of the rain potential will be in the form of patchy storm activity so if you are lucky enough to get a storm or two, then there is potential for useful local rains but in between, falls will be light and patchy.
So, this event is by no means drought-breaking, but at least it is a start.
Moisture levels will continue to build over tropical Australia with the wet season continuing through February.
Some of that moisture will periodically drift into the south-east states while increased activity over the western Pacific and Coral Sea will continue to feed moist air into eastern Queensland, which, in turn, can always find its way south.
So overall, the outlook for the coming one to two months shows signs optimism but we will need the coming together of a few systems if we are going to get widespread, drought relieving rainfalls.
There are no signs at the moment of this happening but if they were to develop, they are more likely to be late summer or early autumn.
As for the longer term indicators, the Indian Ocean Dipole is almost back to zero.
However, the IOD usually has little influence on Australian weather from now until April, while the monsoon trough shifts southwards into the Australian region.
Likewise, to the south, the Southern Annular Mode is also unlikely to affect our weather for the next few months, as is normal over summer and much of autumn.
In the Pacific, the trade winds are close to average and the Southern Oscillation Index is around -5 which is in the neutral range.
It will be worthwhile watching for trends in the SOI in the coming months as long-term models are quite split of what might happen.
One or two indicated that La Nina thresholds could be reached by autumn which would be good news but the SOI has to trend back to the positive for this to occur, so any movement in that direction in the Southern Oscillation Index would be good news.
In any case, the long term (three to nine-month) outlooks are all slightly more positive than they have been for the past couple of years, with none at this stage predicting a return of an El Nino in 2020.
