title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: It was strengthened by the prominent part he played in the events immediately preceding the fall of the Liberal government in 1885; and when Hugh Childers's budget resolutions were defeated by the Conservatives, aided by about half the Parnellites, Lord Randolph Churchill's admirers were justified in proclaiming him to have been the "organiser of victory".


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: In Lord Salisbury's "caretaker" cabinet of 1885, Churchill was appointed Secretary of State for India, assuming office on 24June 1885. As the price of entry he demanded that Sir Stafford Northcote be removed from the Commons, despite being the Conservative leader there. Salisbury was more than willing to concede this, and Northcote went to the Lords as the Earl of Iddlesleigh.


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: Despite entering office with a reputation for progressive views on India, Churchill 's tenure was, in the words of the historian and biographer R.F. Foster, 'traditionally reactionary', and many of his policies focused on exploiting, not developing India. He enthusiastically supported a trade policy which favoured British imports over Indian goods; increased spending on the Indian Army at the expense of public works such as railways, roads and irrigation (all sharply reduced under his secretaryship); and re-directed money which had been set aside for future famine relief to help balance his budget. His attitude towards the native Indians was similarly illiberal. He refused to allow reforms which would have increased Indian representation within the civil service and army, and, in a public speech at Birmingham, he infamously described a deputation to Britain by three Indian politicians, led by N. G. Chandavarkar, as the 'three Bengalee baboos'.


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: However, Churchill's most well-known act during his time at the India Office was his role in the invasion and annexation of Burma in the Third Anglo-Burmese War. Siding with British commercial (especially cotton) and military interests, and hoping to boost Conservative fortunes in the upcoming general election, Churchill directed the Viceroy, Lord Dufferin, to invade Upper Burma in November 1885. With little discussion, Churchill then decided to annex the Burmese kingdom, adding it as a new province of the Indian Raj as a "New Year present" for Queen Victoria on New Year's Day 1886. Not only is the war itself widely regarded as a piece of blatant imperialism, but the continuing guerrilla war lasted into the later 1880s and cost the Indian taxpayer ten times Churchill's original financial estimates.


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: In the autumn election of 1885 he contested Birmingham Central against John Bright, and though defeated here, was at the same time returned by a very large majority for South Paddington.


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: In the contest which arose over William Ewart Gladstone's Home Rule bill, Lord Randolph again bore a conspicuous part, and in the electioneering campaign his activity was only second to that of some of the Liberal Unionists, Lord Hartington, George Goschen and Joseph Chamberlain. He was now the recognised Conservative champion in the Lower Chamber, and when the second Salisbury administration was formed after the general election of 1886 he became Chancellor of the Exchequer and Leader of the House of Commons.


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: Churchill was new to the leadership ranks, and became a relatively isolated figure in the cabinet. He did not think in terms of consulting his supporters and building a base in Commons; instead, he decided to use his strong public support to impose his positions on the Prime Minister in both domestic and foreign affairs. He decided to demonstrate to the public that the Conservatives could be as economical in budgetary matters as Gladstone had been. Therefore, he proposed a budget with significant expenditure reductions that surprised and annoyed the Conservative MPs. They were willing to compromise, but he insisted on additional cuts in the Army and Navy that alarmed the service ministers. Churchill decided to threaten resignation but it proved to be one of the great blunders in British political history. In his resignation letter he stated that it was because he was unable as Chancellor to support the armed services. He expected his resignation to be followed by the unconditional surrender of the cabinet, and his restoration to office on his own terms. Instead, Salisbury accepted the resignation, and Churchill was out in the cold. Goschen replaced him as Chancellor. For the next few years there was some speculation about a return to front-line politics, but Churchill's own career was over. Even so, his economising ideas survived yet in the "Dartford Programme" of September 1886.


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: Although Lord Randolph continued to sit in Parliament, his health was in serious decline throughout the 1890s. He was an ardent patron of horse racing; in 1889, his horse, L'Abbesse de Jouarre, won The Oaks. In 1891 he went to South Africa, in search both of health and relaxation. He travelled for some months through Cape Colony, the Transvaal and Rhodesia, making notes on the politics and economics of the countries, shooting lions, and recording his impressions in letters to a London newspaper, which were afterwards republished under the title of "Men, Mines and Animals in South Africa". He attacked Gladstone's Second Home Rule Bill with energy, and gave fiery pro-Union speeches in Ireland. During this time he coined the phrase "Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right", echoing his earlier remark that in opposing Irish Home Rule "the Orange card would be the one to play".


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: It was soon apparent that Churchill's powers had been undermined by the illness which was to take his life at the age of 45. As the session of 1893 wore on, his speeches lost their old effectiveness. His last speech in the House was delivered in the debate on the East African Scheme in June 1894, and was a painful failure.


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: An attempted round-the-world journey failed to cure Lord Randolph of his debilitating illness. He started in the autumn of 1894, accompanied by his wife, but his health soon became so feeble that he was brought back hurriedly from Cairo. He reached England shortly before Christmas, and died in Westminster the next month. The gross value of his personal estate was entered in the Probate Registry at £75,971 (). He is buried near his wife and sons at St Martin's Church, Bladon, near Woodstock, Oxfordshire.


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: His widow, Lady Randolph Churchill, married George Cornwallis-West in 1900, when she became known as Mrs. George Cornwallis-West. After that marriage was dissolved, she resumed by deed poll her prior married name, Lady Randolph Churchill. (Lord Randolph was her husband's courtesy title as the younger son of a duke and in English law does not qualify as a noble title in its own right.) Lord Randolph's son, Sir Winston Churchill, died on 24 January 1965, aged 90, exactly 70 years after the death of his father, having lived twice as long.


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: Rosebery described his old friend and political opponent, after his death, thus: "his nervous system was always tense and highly strung; ...he seems to have had no knowledge of men, no consideration of their feelings, no give and take." But he continued, "in congenial society, his conversation was wholly delightful. He would then display his mastery of pleasant irony and banter; for with those playthings he was at his best."


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: Biographer Roy Jenkins, pointing to his brash and slightly vulgar charisma, asked, "Was he ever near to being a serious statesman?":


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: Undoubtedly, he had some high political talents. He had a gift for mordant, wounding, sometimes very funny phrases. And, having thought up the most outrageous attack he had the nerve to deliver it, without fear of offending taste or friends or damaging his own repute...He was strong on insolence. He also had other attributes necessary to make his words resound, and his fame increase: a mnemonic name, an idiosyncratic appearance, and good delivery, whether on the platform or in the House of Commons. In addition he had sporadic charm, although intermingled with offensive and often pointless rudeness.


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: Jenkins compares his youth to that of William Pitt the Younger: "Pitt was Prime Minister for 19 of his 46 years. Churchill had 11 months in office and was without rival in attracting so much attention and achieving so little."


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: In the ITV historical drama series "Edward the Seventh", Lord Randolph (played by Derek Fowlds) is featured as a more natural character, sociably similar to Albert Edward, Prince of Wales and his other friends. His downfall is represented when he confronts Alexandra, Princess of Wales and demands she use her influence with the Prince to stop Lord Aylesford proceeding with a divorce from his wife, Lady Aylesford, after she had planned to elope with Lord Randolph's elder brother, the Marquess of Blandford. He threatens to expose letters from the Prince to Lady Aylesford, so scandalous, so he says, that if they were to be exposed, "the Prince of Wales would never sit on the throne of England."


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: Outraged, the Princess goes to see the Queen, who is equally indignant. Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli informs the Prince, who is so angry that he challenges Lord Randolph to a duel in the South of France. Eventually, Lord Aylesford does not attempt to seek a divorce from his wife, and Lord Blandford does not elope with Lady Aylesford. Lord Randolph sends a note of apology to the Prince, which is merely acknowledged. Disgraced, Lord Randolph and his wife leave for America.


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: Other notable appearances include the film "Young Winston", in which he was portrayed by Robert Shaw, and the miniseries "", in which he was portrayed by actor Ronald Pickup, as the English aristocrat who falls in love with the daughter of an American billionaire property developer.


title: Lord Randolph Churchill

text: Sir Winston referred to his father's career in several of the last chapters of "A History of the English-Speaking Peoples" written in Winston's 'wilderness years' in the inter-war years before he was recalled to the cabinet.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Earth's inner core is the innermost geologic layer of planet Earth. It is primarily a solid ball with a radius of about , which is about 20% of Earth's radius or 70% of the Moon's radius.


title: Earth's inner core

text: There are no samples of Earth's core accessible for direct measurement, as there are for Earth's mantle. Information about Earth's core mostly comes from analysis of seismic waves and Earth's magnetic field. The inner core is believed to be composed of an iron–nickel alloy with some other elements. The temperature at the inner core's surface is estimated to be approximately , which is about the temperature at the surface of the Sun.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Earth was discovered to have a solid inner core distinct from its molten outer core in 1936, by the Danish seismologist Inge Lehmann, who deduced its presence by studying seismograms from earthquakes in New Zealand. She observed that the seismic waves reflect off the boundary of the inner core and can be detected by sensitive seismographs on the Earth's surface. She inferred a radius of 1400 km for the inner core, not far from the currently accepted value of 1221 km. In 1938, Beno Gutenberg and Charles Richter analyzed a more extensive set of data and estimated the thickness of the outer core as 1950 km with a steep but continuous 300 km thick transition to the inner core; implying a radius between 1230 and 1530 km for the inner core.


title: Earth's inner core

text: A few years later, in 1940, it was hypothesized that this inner core was made of solid iron. In 1952, Francis Birch published a detailed analysis of the available data and concluded that the inner core was probably crystalline iron.


title: Earth's inner core

text: The boundary between the inner and outer cores is sometimes called the "Lehmann discontinuity", although the name usually refers to another discontinuity. The name "Bullen" or "Lehmann-Bullen discontinuity", after Keith Edward Bullen has been proposed, but its use seems to be rare. The rigidity of the inner core was confirmed in 1971.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Adam Dziewonski and James Freeman Gilbert established that measurements of normal modes of vibration of Earth caused by large earthquakes were consistent with a liquid outer core. In 2005, shear waves were detected passing through the inner core; these claims were initially controversial, but are now gaining acceptance.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Almost all direct measurements that scientists have about the physical properties of the inner core are the seismic waves that pass through it. The most informative waves are generated by deep earthquakes, 30 km or more below the surface of the Earth (where the mantle is relatively more homogeneous) and recorded by seismographs as they reach the surface, all over the globe.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Seismic waves include "P" (primary or pressure) waves, compressional waves that can travel through solid or liquid materials, and "S" (secondary or shear) shear waves that can only propagate through rigid elastic solids. The two waves have different velocities and are damped at different rates as they travel through the same material.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Of particular interest are the so-called "PKiKP" waves—pressure waves (P) that start near the surface, cross the mantle-core boundary, travel through the core (K), are reflected at the inner core boundary (i), cross again the liquid core (K), cross back into the mantle, and are detected as pressure waves (P) at the surface. Also of interest are the "PKIKP" waves, that travel through the inner core (I) instead of being reflected at its surface (i). Those signals are easier to interpret when the path from source to detector is close to a straight line—namely, when the receiver is just above the source for the reflected PKiKP waves, and antipodal to it for the transmitted PKIKP waves.


title: Earth's inner core

text: While S waves cannot reach or leave the inner core as such, P waves can be converted into S waves, and vice versa, as they hit the boundary between the inner and outer core at an oblique angle. The "PKJKP" waves are similar to the PKIKP waves, but are converted into S waves when they enter the inner core, travel through it as S waves (J), and are converted again into P waves when they exit the inner core. Thanks to this phenomenon, it is known that the inner core can propagate S waves, and therefore must be solid.


title: Earth's inner core

text: The velocity of the S waves in the core varies smoothly from about 3.7 km/s at the center to about 3.5 km/s at the surface. That is considerably less than the velocity of S waves in the lower crust (about 4.5 km/s) and less than half the velocity in the deep mantle, just above the outer core (about 7.3 km/s).


title: Earth's inner core

text: The velocity of the P-waves in the core also varies smoothly through the inner core, from about 11.4 km/s at the center to about 11.1 km/s at the surface. Then the speed drops abruptly at the inner-outer core boundary to about 10.4 km/s.


title: Earth's inner core

text: On the basis of the seismic data, the inner core is estimated to be about 1221 km in radius (2442 km in diameter), which is about 19% of the radius of the Earth and 70% of the radius of the Moon.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Its volume is about 7.6 billion cubic km (), which is about (0.69%) of the volume of the whole Earth.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Its shape is believed to be close to an oblate ellipsoid of revolution, like the surface of the Earth, only that more spherical: The flattening "f" is estimated to be between and ; meaning that the radius along the Earth's axis is estimated to be about 3 km shorter than the radius at the equator. In comparison, the flattening of the Earth as a whole is close to , and the polar radius is 21 km shorter than the equatorial one.


title: Earth's inner core

text: The pressure in the Earth's inner core is slightly higher than it is at the boundary between the outer and inner cores: It ranges from about .


title: Earth's inner core

text: The acceleration of gravity at the surface of the inner core can be computed to be 4.3 m/s; which is less than half the value at the surface of the Earth (9.8 m/s).


title: Earth's inner core

text: The density of the inner core is believed to vary smoothly from about 13.0 kg/L (= g/cm = t/m) at the center to about 12.8 kg/L at the surface. As it happens with other material properties, the density drops suddenly at that surface: The liquid just above the inner core is believed to be significantly less dense, at about 12.1 kg/L. For comparison, the average density in the upper 100 km of the Earth is about 3.4 kg/L.


title: Earth's inner core

text: That density implies a mass of about 10 kg for the inner core, which is (1.7%) of the mass of the whole Earth.


title: Earth's inner core

text: The temperature of the inner core can be estimated from the melting temperature of impure iron at the pressure which iron is under at the boundary of the inner core (about 330 GPa). From these considerations, in 2002 D. Alfè and others estimated its temperature as between and . However, in 2013 S. Anzellini and others obtained experimentally a substantially higher temperature for the melting point of iron, 6230 ± 500 K.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Iron can be solid at such high temperatures only because its melting temperature increases dramatically at pressures of that magnitude (see the Clausius–Clapeyron relation).


title: Earth's inner core

text: In 2010, Bruce Buffett determined that the average magnetic field in the liquid outer core is about 2.5 milliteslas (25 gauss), which is about 40 times the maximum strength at the surface. He started from the known fact that the Moon and Sun cause tides in the liquid outer core, just as they do on the oceans on the surface. He observed that motion of the liquid through the local magnetic field creates electric currents, that dissipate energy as heat according to Ohm's law. This dissipation, in turn, damps the tidal motions and explains previously detected anomalies in Earth's nutation. From the magnitude of the latter effect he could calculate the magnetic field. The field inside the inner core presumably has a similar strength. While indirect, this measurement does not depend significantly on any assumptions about the evolution of the Earth or the composition of the core.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Although seismic waves propagate through the core as if it was solid, the measurements cannot distinguish between a solid material from an extremely viscous one. Some scientists have therefore considered whether there may be slow convection in the inner core (as is believed to exist in the mantle). That could be an explanation for the anisotropy detected in seismic studies. In 2009, B. Buffett estimated the viscosity of the inner core at 10 Pa·s, which is a sextillion times the viscosity of water, and more than a billion times that of pitch.


title: Earth's inner core

text: There is still no direct evidence about the composition of the inner core. However, based on the relative prevalence of various chemical elements in the Solar System, the theory of planetary formation, and constraints imposed or implied by the chemistry of the rest of the Earth's volume, the inner core is believed to consist primarily of an iron–nickel alloy.


title: Earth's inner core

text: At the known pressures and estimated temperatures of the core, it is predicted that pure iron could be solid, but its density would exceed the known density of the core by approximately 3%. That result implies the presence of lighter elements in the core, such as silicon, oxygen, or sulfur, in addition to the probable presence of nickel. Recent estimates (2007) allow for up to 10% nickel and 2–3% of unidentified lighter elements.


title: Earth's inner core

text: According to computations by D. Alfè and others, the liquid outer core contains 8–13% of oxygen, but as the iron crystallizes out to form the inner core the oxygen is mostly left in the liquid.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Laboratory experiments and analysis of seismic wave velocities seem to indicate that the inner core consists specifically of ε-iron, a crystalline form of the metal with the hexagonal close-packed () structure. That structure can still admit the inclusion of small amounts of nickel and other elements.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Also, if the inner core grows by precipitation of frozen particles falling onto its surface, then some liquid can also be trapped in the pore spaces. In that case, some of this residual fluid may still persist to some small degree in much of its interior.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Many scientists had initially expected that the inner core would be found to be homogeneous, because that same process should have proceeded uniformly during its entire formation. It was even suggested that Earth's inner core might be a single crystal of iron.


title: Earth's inner core

text: In 1983, G. Poupinet and others observed that the travel time of PKIKP waves (P waves that travel through the inner core) was about 2 seconds less for straight north–south paths than straight paths on the equatorial plane. Even taking into account the flattening of the Earth at the poles (about 0.33% for the whole Earth, 0.25% for the inner core) and crust and upper mantle heterogeneities, this difference implied that P waves (of a broad range of wavelengths) travel through the inner core about 1% faster in the north–south direction than along directions perpendicular to that.


title: Earth's inner core

text: This P wave speed anisotropy has been confirmed by later studies, including more seismic data and study of the free oscillations of the whole Earth. Some authors have claimed higher values for the difference, up to 4.8%; however, in 2017 D. Frost and B. Romanowicz confirmed that the value is between 0.5% and 1.5%.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Some authors have claimed that P wave speed is faster in directions that are oblique or perpendicular to the N−S axis, at least in some regions of the inner core. However, these claims have been disputed by D. Frost and B. Romanowicz, who instead claim that the direction of maximum speed is as close to the Earth's rotation axis as can be determined.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Laboratory data and theoretical computations indicate that the propagation of pressure waves in the crystals of ε-iron are strongly anisotropic, too, with one "fast" axis and two equally "slow" ones. A preference for the crystals in the core to align in the north–south direction could account for the observed seismic anomaly.


title: Earth's inner core

text: One phenomenon that could cause such partial alignment is slow flow ("creep") inside the inner core, from the equator towards the poles or vice versa. That flow would cause the crystals to partially reorient themselves according to the direction of the flow. In 1996, S. Yoshida and others proposed that such a flow could be caused by higher rate of freezing at the equator than at polar latitudes. An equator-to-pole flow then would set up in the inner core, tending to restore the isostatic equilibrium of its surface.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Others suggested that the required flow could be caused by slow thermal convection inside the inner core. T. Yukutake claimed in 1998 that such convective motions were unlikely. However, B. Buffet in 2009 estimated the viscosity of the inner core and found that such convection could have happened, especially when the core was smaller.


title: Earth's inner core

text: On the other hand, M. Bergman in 1997 proposed that the anisotropy was due to an observed tendency of iron crystals to grow faster when their crystallographic axes are aligned with the direction of the cooling heat flow. He, therefore, proposed that the heat flow out of the inner core would be biased towards the radial direction.


title: Earth's inner core

text: In 1998, S. Karato proposed that changes in the magnetic field might also deform the inner core slowly over time.


title: Earth's inner core

text: In 2002, M. Ishii and A. Dziewoński presented evidence that the solid inner core contained an "innermost inner core" (IMIC) with somewhat different properties than the shell around it. The nature of the differences and radius of the IMIC are still unresolved as of 2019, with proposals for the latter ranging from 300 km to 750 km.


title: Earth's inner core

text: A. Wang and X. Song proposed, in 2018, a three-layer model, with an "inner inner core" (IIC) with about 500 km radius, an "outer inner core" (OIC) layer about 600 km thick, and an isotropic shell 100 km thick. In this model, the "faster P wave" direction would be parallel to the Earth's axis in the OIC, but perpendicular to that axis in the IIC. However, the conclusion has been disputed by claims that there need not be sharp discontinuities in the inner core, only a gradual change of properties with depth.


title: Earth's inner core

text: In 1997, S. Tanaka and H. Hamaguchi claimed, on the basis of seismic data, that the anisotropy of the inner core material, while oriented N−S, was more pronounced in "eastern" hemisphere of the inner core (at about 110 °E longitude, roughly under Borneo) than in the "western" hemisphere (at about 70 °W, roughly under Colombia).


title: Earth's inner core

text: Alboussère and others proposed that this asymmetry could be due to melting in the Eastern hemisphere and re-crystallization in the Western one. C. Finlay conjectured that this process could explain the asymmetry in the Earth's magnetic field.


title: Earth's inner core

text: However, in 2017 D. Frost and B. Romanowicz disputed those earlier inferences, claiming that the data shows only a weak anisotropy, with the speed in the N−S direction being only 0.5% to 1.5% faster than in equatorial directions, and no clear signs of E−W variation.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Other researchers claim that the properties of the inner core's surface vary from place to place across distances as small as 1 km. This variation is surprising since lateral temperature variations along the inner-core boundary are known to be extremely small (this conclusion is confidently constrained by magnetic field observations).


title: Earth's inner core

text: The Earth's inner core is thought to be slowly growing as the liquid outer core at the boundary with the inner core cools and solidifies due to the gradual cooling of the Earth's interior (about 100 degrees Celsius per billion years).


title: Earth's inner core

text: According to calculations by Alfé and others, as the iron crystallizes onto the inner core, the liquid just above it becomes enriched in oxygen, and therefore less dense than the rest of the outer core. This process creates convection currents in the outer core, which are thought to be the prime driver for the currents that create the Earth's magnetic field.


title: Earth's inner core

text: The existence of the inner core also affects the dynamic motions of liquid in the outer core, and thus may help fix the magnetic field.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Because the inner core is not rigidly connected to the Earth's solid mantle, the possibility that it rotates slightly more quickly or slowly than the rest of Earth has long been entertained. In the 1990s, seismologists made various claims about detecting this kind of super-rotation by observing changes in the characteristics of seismic waves passing through the inner core over several decades, using the aforementioned property that it transmits waves more quickly in some directions. In 1996, X. Song and P. Richards estimated this "super-rotation" of the inner core relative to the mantle as about one degree per year. In 2005, they and J. Zhang compared recordings of "seismic doublets" (recordings by the same station of earthquakes occurring in the same location on the opposite side of the Earth, years apart), and revised that estimate to 0.3 to 0.5 degree per year.


title: Earth's inner core

text: In 1999, M. Greff-Lefftz and H. Legros noted that the gravitational fields of the Sun and Moon that are responsible for ocean tides also apply torques to the Earth, affecting its axis of rotation and a slowing down of its rotation rate. Those torques are felt mainly by the crust and mantle, so that their rotation axis and speed may differ from overall rotation of the fluid in the outer core and the rotation of the inner core. The dynamics is complicated because of the currents and magnetic fields in the inner core. They find that the axis of the inner core wobbles (nutates) slightly with a period of about 1 day. With some assumptions on the evolution of the Earth, they conclude that the fluid motions in the outer core would have entered resonance with the tidal forces at several times in the past (3.0, 1.8, and 0.3 billion years ago). During those epochs, which lasted 200–300 million years each, the extra heat generated by stronger fluid motions might have stopped the growth of the inner core.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Theories about the age of the core are necessarily part of theories of the history of Earth as a whole. This has been a long-debated topic and is still under discussion at the present time. It is widely believed that the Earth's solid inner core formed out of an initially completely liquid core as the Earth cooled down. However, there is still no firm evidence about the time when this process started.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Two main approaches have been used to infer the age of the inner core: thermodynamic modeling of the cooling of the Earth, and analysis of paleomagnetic evidence. The estimates yielded by these methods still vary over a large range, from 0.5 to 2 billion years old.


title: Earth's inner core

text: One of the ways to estimate the age of the inner core is by modeling the cooling of the Earth, constrained by a minimum value for the heat flux at the core–mantle boundary (CMB). That estimate is based on the prevailing theory that the Earth's magnetic field is primarily triggered by convection currents in the liquid part of the core, and the fact that a minimum heat flux is required to sustain those currents. The heat flux at the CMB at present time can be reliably estimated because it is related to the measured heat flux at Earth's surface and to the measured rate of mantle convection.


title: Earth's inner core

text: In 2001, S. Labrosse and others, assuming that there were no radioactive elements in the core, gave an estimate of 1±0.5 billion years for the age of the inner core — considerably less than the estimated age of the Earth and of its liquid core (about 4.5 billion years) In 2003, the same group concluded that, if the core contained a reasonable amount of radioactive elements, the inner core's age could be a few hundred million years older.


title: Earth's inner core

text: In 2012, theoretical computations by M. Pozzo and others indicated that the electrical conductivity of iron and other hypothetical core materials, at the high pressures and temperatures expected there, were two or three times higher than assumed in previous research. These predictions were confirmed in 2013 by measurements by Gomi and others. The higher values for electrical conductivity led to increased estimates of the thermal conductivity, to 90 W/m·K; which, in turn, lowered estimates of its age to less than 700 million years old.


title: Earth's inner core

text: However, in 2016 Konôpková and others directly measured the thermal conductivity of solid iron at inner core conditions, and obtained a much lower value, 18–44 W/m·K. With those values, they obtained an upper bound of 4.2 billion years for the age of the inner core, compatible with the paleomagnetic evidence.


title: Earth's inner core

text: In 2014, Driscoll and Bercovici published a thermal history of the Earth that avoided the so-called mantle "thermal catastrophe" and "new core paradox" by invoking 3 TW of radiogenic heating by the decay of in the core. Such high abundances of K in the core are not supported by experimental partitioning studies, so such a thermal history remains highly debatable.


title: Earth's inner core

text: Another way to estimate the age of the Earth is to analyze changes in the magnetic field of Earth during its history, as trapped in rocks that formed at various times (the "paleomagnetic record"). The presence or absence of the solid inner core could result in different dynamic processes in the core that could lead to noticeable changes in the magnetic field.


title: Earth's inner core

text: In 2011, Smirnov and others published an analysis of the paleomagnetism in a large sample of rocks that formed in the Neoarchean (2.8–2.5 billion years ago) and the Proterozoic (2.5–0.541 billion). They found that the geomagnetic field was closer to that of a magnetic dipole during the Neoarchean than after it. They interpreted that change as evidence that the dynamo effect was more deeply seated in the core during that epoch, whereas in the later time currents closer to the core-mantle boundary grew in importance. They further speculate that the change may have been due to growth of the solid inner core between 3.5–2.0 billion years ago.


title: Earth's inner core

text: In 2015, Biggin and others published the analysis of an extensive and carefully selected set of Precambrian samples and observed a prominent increase in the Earth's magnetic field strength and variance around 1.0–1.5 billion years ago. This change had not been noticed before due to the lack of sufficient robust measurements. They speculated that the change could be due to the birth of Earth's solid inner core. From their age estimate they derived a rather modest value for the thermal conductivity of the outer core, that allowed for simpler models of the Earth's thermal evolution.


title: Earth's inner core

text: In 2016, P. Driscoll published a numerical "evolving dynamo" model that made a detailed prediction of the paleomagnetic field evolution over 0.0–2.0 Ga. The "evolving dynamo" model was driven by time-variable boundary conditions produced by the thermal history solution in Driscoll and Bercovici (2014). The "evolving dynamo" model predicted a strong-field dynamo prior to 1.7 Ga that is multipolar, a strong-field dynamo from 1.0–1.7 Ga that is predominantly dipolar, a weak-field dynamo from 0.6–1.0 Ga that is a non-axial dipole, and a strong-field dynamo after inner core nucleation from 0.0–0.6 Ga that is predominantly dipolar.


title: Earth's inner core

text: An analysis of rock samples from the Ediacaran epoch (formed about 565 million years ago), published by Bono and others in 2019, revealed unusually low intensity and two distinct directions for the geomagnetic field during that time that provides support for the predictions by Driscoll (2016). Considering other evidence of high frequency of magnetic field reversals around that time, they speculate that those anomalies could be due to the onset of formation of the inner core, which would then be 0.5 billion years old. A "News and Views" by P. Driscoll summarizes the state of the field following the Bono results.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Australia's climate is governed mostly by its size and by the hot, sinking air of the subtropical high pressure belt (subtropical ridge or Australian High). This moves north-west and north-east with the seasons. The climate is variable, with frequent droughts lasting several seasons, thought to be caused in part by the El Niño-Southern Oscillation. Australia has a wide variety of climates due to its large geographical size. The largest part of Australia is desert or semi-arid. Only the south-east and south-west corners have a temperate climate and moderately fertile soil. The northern part of the country has a tropical climate, varying between grasslands and desert. Australia holds many heat-related records: the continent has the hottest extended region year-round, the areas with the hottest summer climate, and the highest sunshine duration.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Because Australia is a medium-sized continent, separated from polar regions by the Southern Ocean, it is not subject to movements of frigid polar air during winter, of the type that sweep over the continents in the northern hemisphere during their winter. Consequently, Australia's winter is relatively mild, with less contrast between summer and winter temperatures than in the northern continents–though the transition is more dramatically marked in alpine regions of Australia and places of substantial elevation. Seasonal highs and lows can still be considerable. Temperatures have ranged from above to . Minimum temperatures are moderated.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The El Niño–Southern Oscillation is associated with seasonal abnormality in many areas in the world. Australia is one of the continents most affected and experiences extensive droughts alongside considerable wet periods. Occasionally a dust storm will blanket a region and there are reports of the occasional tornado. Tropical cyclones, heat waves, bushfires and frosts in the country are also associated with the Southern Oscillation. Rising levels of salinity and desertification in some areas is ravaging the landscape.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Climate change in Australia is a highly contentious political issue. Temperatures in the country rose by approximately 0.7 °C between 1910 and 2004, following an increasing trend of global warming. Overnight minimum temperatures have warmed more rapidly than daytime maximum temperatures in recent years. The late-20th century warming has been largely attributed to the increased greenhouse effect. According to the Bureau of Meteorology (BOM), 80% of the land receives less than of rainfall annually and 50% has even less than . As a whole, Australia has a very low annual average rainfall of .


title: Climate of Australia

text: Because of its higher general elevation of over , southern latitude and entirely landlocked location, winters are exclusively cool to cold in the Australian Capital Territory. Canberra has warm to hot, dry summers with some thunderstorms. Heavy frosts are commonplace and radiation fog often occurs. Many of the higher mountains to the territory's west are snow-covered for a large part of the winter and early spring. Thunderstorms can occur between October and March, and annual rainfall is , with rainfall highest in spring and summer and lowest in winter. The region is dry throughout its entirety due to its position on the leeward side of the Brindabella Ranges.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The highest temperature recorded in the ACT was at Canberra Airport on 4 January 2020. The lowest temperature was at Gudgenby on 11 July 1971.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Over half of New South Wales has an arid or semi-arid climate. The eastern portion has a temperate climate, ranging from humid subtropical from its northern border to the Central Coast and most of Sydney, and oceanic to the south coast. The Snowy Mountains region in the south-east falls in the alpine climate or subpolar oceanic climate zone, with cool to cold weather all year around and regular heavy snowfalls in the winter and spring. Further inland, the climate is semi-arid and a desert climate towards the western part of the state.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The weather in the southern half of the state is generally warm to hot in summer and cool in the winter. The seasons are more defined in the southern half of the state, especially in the South West Slopes, Central West and the Riverina regions. On the coast and anywhere east of the dividing range, a summer rainfall peak is observed throughout its entire latitudinal span. On the ranges and farther inland, rainfall usually peaks in spring in most of parts of the state, though the South West Slopes region, in the south-central part of the state (bordering Victoria), has a distinct winter rainfall peak; whereas the New England and North West Slopes regions have a summer rainfall peak. On a hot summer day, a southerly buster may at times moderate the extreme heat experienced in the coastal New South Wales region, from Port Macquarie southwards to Nowra.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The warmest region by annual maxima is the north-west, where summers are extremely hot, but winters relatively cooler and dry. The weather in the northeast region of the state, or the North Coast, bordering Queensland, is moderately hot, humid and rainy in the summer, and mild in winter with more sunshine; and little seasonal temperature difference. The Northern Tablelands have relatively milder summers and colder winters, due to their high elevation and inland location on the Great Dividing Range. The southeast coastal plain, which lies on the leeward side of the Great Dividing Range, experiences foehn winds, particularly between winter and spring, which can elevate fire danger.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The coldest region is the Snowy Mountains where the snow and ice continues for a long period during the winter months. The Blue Mountains, Southern Tablelands and Central Tablelands, which are situated on the Great Dividing Range, have mild to warm summers and cold winters, although not as severe as those in the Snowy Mountains. The areas situated in the valleys of the range, such as Bathurst, Goulburn and Bowral, among other places, have recorded freezing and/or near-freezing lows in most months of the year, unlike other places of similar latitude and altitude in the northern hemisphere.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The highest maximum temperature recorded was at Menindee in the state's west on 10 January 1939. The lowest minimum temperature was at Charlotte Pass on 29 June 1994 in the Snowy Mountains. This is also the lowest temperature recorded in the whole of Australia excluding Australian Antarctic Territory.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Rainfall varies throughout the state. The far northwest receives the least, less than annually, while the east receives between of rain.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The Northern Territory has two distinctive climate zones. The northern end, including Darwin, has a tropical savannah climate (Köppen "Aw") with high humidity and two seasons, the wet (October to April) and dry season (May to September). During the dry season nearly every day is warm and sunny, and afternoon humidity averages around 30%. There is very little rainfall between May and September. In the coolest months of June and July, the daily minimum temperature may dip as low as , but very rarely lower, and frost has never been recorded.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The wet season is associated with tropical cyclones and monsoon rains. The majority of rainfall occurs between December and March (the Southern Hemisphere summer), when thunderstorms are common and afternoon relative humidity averages over 70% during the wettest months. On average more than of rain falls in the north. Thunderstorms can produce spectacular lightning displays.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The rest of the territory lies in the desert centre of the country; it includes Alice Springs and Uluru, and is arid or semi-arid with little rain usually falling during the hottest months from October to March. Its seasons are more defined than the northern parts, with summers being very hot, with average temperatures often exceeding , and winters relatively cool with average minimum temperatures dipping as low as , with a few frosty nights. Central Australia receives less than of annual rainfall.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The highest maximum temperature recorded in the territory was at Finke on 1 and 2 January 1960. The lowest minimum temperature was at Alice Springs on 12 July 1976.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Because of its size, there is significant variation in climate across the state. Low rainfall and hot summers are typical for the inland west, a monsoonal 'wet' season in the far north, and warm subtropical conditions along the coastal strip. Inland and in southern ranges cooler temperatures are experienced, especially at nights. The climate of the coastal strip is influenced by warm ocean waters, keeping the region free from extremes of temperature and providing moisture for rainfall.


title: Climate of Australia

text: However, most of the Queensland populace experience two weather seasons: a winter period of rather warm temperatures with minimal rainfall, and a sultry summer period of hot, sticky temperatures and more rain.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The highest maximum temperature observed in the state is at Birdsville on 24 December 1972. The temperature of at Cloncurry on 16 January 1889 is not considered official; the figure quoted from Birdsville is the next highest, so that record is considered as being official.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The lowest minimum temperature is at Stanthorpe on 23 June 1961 and at The Hermitage on 12 July 1965.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The majority of the state has the arid and semi-arid climates. The southern coastal parts of the state have a Mediterranean climate with mild wet winters and hot dry summers. The highest rainfall occurs along the southern coasts and the Mount Lofty Ranges (with an average annual rainfall of in the vicinity of Mount Lofty); the lowest rainfall occurs in the Lake Eyre basin where the average annual totals are less than and possibly even . Most of the rain in the southern districts of the State fall during the winter months when the sub-tropical high-pressure belt is displaced to the north over the Australian continent.


title: Climate of Australia

text: South Australia's mean temperature range is in January and in July. Daily temperatures in parts of the state in January and February can be up to . The highest maximum temperature was recorded as at Oodnadatta on 2 January 1960, which is the highest official temperature recorded in Australia. The lowest minimum temperature was at Yongala on 20 July 1976.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Tasmania has a cool temperate climate, with most areas under an oceanic climate ("Cfb"), with four distinct seasons. Summer lasts from December to February when the average maximum sea temperature is and inland areas around Launceston reach . Other inland areas are much cooler; Liawenee, located on the Central Plateau, is one of the coldest places in Australia with February temperatures ranging between . Autumn lasts between March and May and experiences changeable weather, where summer weather patterns gradually take on the shape of winter patterns.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The highest recorded maximum temperature in Tasmania was at Scamander on 30 January 2009, during the 2009 south-eastern Australia heat wave. Tasmania's lowest recorded minimum temperature was on 7 August 2020, at Liawenee.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Victoria has a varied climate despite its small size. It ranges from semi-arid and hot in the north-west, to temperate and cool along the coast. Victoria's main land feature, the Great Dividing Range, produces a cooler, mountain climate in the centre and east of the state.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The coastal plain south of the Great Dividing Range has Victoria's mildest climate. Regular frontal systems off the Southern Ocean significantly mitigate the heat of summer. Melbourne and other large cities are located in this temperate region.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The Mallee and upper Wimmera are Victoria's warmest regions with hot winds blowing from nearby deserts. Average temperatures top during summer and in winter. Victoria's highest maximum temperature of was recorded in Hopetoun on 7 February 2009, during the 2009 south-eastern Australia heat wave. A screen temperature of was recorded on 7 January 1906 in Mildura.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The Victorian Alps in the eastern and central regions constitute the coldest climate of Victoria. The Alps are part of the Great Dividing Range extending east–west through the centre of Victoria. Average maximum temperatures are less than in winter and below in the highest parts of the ranges. The state's lowest minimum temperature of was recorded at Omeo on 13 June 1965, and again at Falls Creek on 3 July 1970.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Victoria is the wettest Australian state after Tasmania. Rainfall in Victoria increases from north to south, with higher averages in areas of high altitude. Median annual rainfall exceeds in some parts of the Northeast but is less than in the Mallee.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Rain is heaviest in the Otway Ranges on the southwest coast and West Gippsland in South-Central Victoria, and in the mountainous Northeast. Snow often falls on the low-lying hilly country in the centre of the state, and on rare occasions may also fall to sea level. Rain falls most frequently in winter, but summer precipitation is heavier. Rainfall is most reliable in Gippsland and the Western District, making them both leading farming areas. Victoria's highest recorded daily rainfall was at Tanybryn in the Otway Ranges on 22 March 1983.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Most of Western Australia has a hot arid and semi-arid climate. However, the south-west corner of the state has a Mediterranean climate. The area was originally heavily forested, including large stands of the karri, one of the world's tallest trees. This agricultural region of Western Australia is in the top nine terrestrial habitats for terrestrial biodiversity, with a higher proportion of endemic species than most other equivalent regions. Due to the offshore Leeuwin Current, the area numbers in the top six regions for marine biodiversity, containing the most southerly coral reefs in the world.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Average annual rainfall varies from at the edge of the Wheatbelt region to in the wettest areas near Northcliffe, the southwesternmost tip of Australia, but in the months of November to March, although rain still falls, evaporation exceeds rainfall and it is generally very dry. Plants must be adapted to this as well as the extreme poverty of all soils. A major reduction in rainfall has been observed, with a greater number of rainfall events in the summer months. The central four-fifths of the state is semi-arid or desert and is lightly inhabited with the only significant activity being mining. Annual rainfall averages about , most of which occurs in sporadic torrential falls related to cyclone events in summer months.


title: Climate of Australia

text: An exception to this is the northern tropical regions. The Kimberley has an extremely hot monsoonal climate with average annual rainfall ranging from , but there is a very long dry season of 7 months from April to November. Eighty-five per cent of the state's runoff occurs in the Kimberley, but because it occurs in violent floods and because of the insurmountable poverty of the generally shallow soils, development has only taken place along the Ord River.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Australia's tropical/subtropical location and cold waters off the western coast make most of Western Australia a hot desert with aridity a marked feature of a greater part of the continent. These cold waters produce precious little moisture needed on the mainland. A 2005 study by Australian and American researchers investigated the desertification of the interior, and suggested that one explanation was related to human settlers who arrived about 50,000 years ago.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Snowfall in the state is rare, and typically only in the Stirling Range near Albany, the southwesternmost point in WA, the only mountain range far enough south and with sufficient elevation. More rarely, snow can fall on the nearby Porongurup Range. Snow outside these areas is a major event; it usually occurs in hilly areas of south-western Australia. The most widespread low-level snow occurred on 26 June 1956 when snow was reported in the Perth Hills, as far north as Wongan Hills and as far east as Salmon Gums. However, even in the Stirling Range, snowfalls rarely exceed and rarely settle for more than one day.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The highest observed maximum temperature of was recorded at Mardie Station on 19 February 1998. The lowest minimum temperature recorded was at Eyre Bird Observatory on 17 August 2008.


title: Climate of Australia

text: More than 80% of Australia has an annual rainfall of less than ; among the continents, only Antarctica receives less rainfall. A place inland near Lake Eyre (in South Australia) would only receive of rain annually. Another place, Troudaninna Bore (, altitude : 46 m) in South Australia, from 1893 to 1936, received, in average, 104.9 mm (4.13 inches) of precipitation. From one extreme to another, parts of the far North Queensland coast annually average over , with the Australian annual record being , set at the summit of Mount Bellenden Ker in 2000. Four factors contribute to the dryness of the Australian landmass:


title: Climate of Australia

text: The average annual rainfall in the Australian desert is low, ranging from . Thunderstorms are relatively common in the region, with an annual average of 15 to 20 thunderstorms. Summer daytime temperatures range from ; winter temperatures run .


title: Climate of Australia

text: The southern parts of Australia get the usual westerly winds and rain-bearing cold fronts that come when high–pressure systems move towards northern Australia during winter. Cold snaps may bring frosts inland, though temperatures near the coast are mild or near mild all year round. The Australian northwest cloudbands provides up to 80% of the annual rainfall for northwestern Australia and up to 40% of the annual rainfall for southwestern Australia, including most of the winter rainfall over northwest Western Australia and Central Australia. Summers in southern Australia are generally dry and hot with coastal sea breezes. During a lengthy dry spell, hot and dry winds from the interior can cause bushfires in some southern and eastern states, though most commonly Victoria and New South Wales.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The tropical areas of northern Australia have a wet summer because of the monsoon. During "the wet", typically October to April, humid north-westerly winds bring showers and thunderstorms. Occasionally, tropical cyclones can bring heavy rainfall to tropical coastal regions, which is also likely to reach further inland. After the monsoonal season, the dry season comes ("winter"), which brings mostly clear skies and milder conditions.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Rainfall records tend to be concentrated along the east coast of Australia, particularly in tropical north Queensland. The highest 24‑hour rainfall on record in Australia was in Crohamhurst on 3 February 1893. The highest monthly rainfall on record was recorded at Mount Bellenden Ker, Queensland in January 1979. The highest annual rainfall was recorded also at Mount Bellenden Ker in 2000. Additionally, the location which receives the highest average annual rainfall in Australia is Babinda in Queensland with an annual average of .


title: Climate of Australia

text: Cold ocean currents off the coast of Western Australia result in little evaporation occurring. Hence, rain clouds are sparsely formed and rarely do they form long enough for a continuous period of rain to be recorded. Australia's arid/semi-arid zone extends to this region. The absence of any significant mountain range or area of substantial height above sea level, results in very little rainfall caused by orographic uplift. In the east the Great Dividing Range limits rain moving into inland Australia.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Australia has a compact shape, and no significant bodies of water penetrate very far inland. This is important in as much as moist winds are prevented from penetrating inland, so keeping rainfall low.


title: Climate of Australia

text: In Australia, snow falls frequently on the highlands near the east coast, in the states of Victoria, New South Wales and Tasmania and in the Australian Capital Territory. There is a regular snow season in several areas which have seasonal ski tourism industries, such as Thredbo, Cabramurra, Mount Buller and Perisher Ski Resort, among others. Snow falls with some regularity below on the Great Dividing Range, seldom as far north as Stanthorpe in southernmost Queensland and in isolated parts of South Australia and Western Australia, but outside these areas, snow is an extremely rare occurrence. Snow has also fallen on Uluru and near Alice Springs on at least one occasion.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Snow at sea level is occasionally recorded on mainland Australia (namely in southwestern and south-central Victoria), but is more frequent in Tasmania where snowfalls at sea level can occur nigh to annually during the winter months; and in the extreme event of November 2021, snow was recorded to sea level on Bruny Island. Snow has been recorded across most of Tasmania, though it is rare on the northern coast at sea level. Snow is rare in the southernmost capitals like Melbourne and Hobart, falling less than once every five years, and in the other capitals it is unknown (however snow has fallen in the hill suburbs of Perth and Adelaide). There are extensive, well-developed ski fields in the Great Dividing Range, a few hours' drive from Melbourne and Sydney. Light snow generally falls every winter in Canberra, and other cities that receive more regular seasonal snowfalls include Orange, Oberon, Lithgow and Katoomba in New South Wales. West of the Great Dividing Range, particularly in the South West Slopes, snow is observed more frequently and to much lower altitudes than on the eastern side (even Parkes and Forbes have recorded snow).


title: Climate of Australia

text: The occasional cold snap, caused by cold air drifting north from Antarctica, can cause significant snowfall in rural areas, as well as major cities such as Hobart, Melbourne's outer mountain suburbs and Canberra. Such occasions are rare, but have occurred in 1958, 1965, 1986, 2005 and 2015, the 1965 event causing snow to fall as far north as Eungella, near Mackay in tropical Queensland. Extreme snow events have also produced snow as far north-west as Longreach in Queensland and in the ranges near Alice Springs, and also in lowland towns such as Dubbo and Wagga Wagga in New South Wales. The frequency and intensity of such events have been decreasing significantly over the past 40 years and the most northerly occurrence of snow in this time frame has been the Bunya Mountains in southern Queensland.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The tropical savannah zone of Northern Australia is warm to hot all year. Summers are hot in most of the country with average January maximum temperatures exceeding 30 °C over most of the mainland, except for high elevations. Winters are warm in the north and cool in the south, with nightly frosts common in inland areas south of the Tropic of Capricorn. Only at the highly elevated areas do wintertime temperatures approach those found in much of Europe or North America, especially the southern parts.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Temperatures in Australia have followed an increasing trend between the years of 1910 to 2004 by approximately 0.7 °C. Overnight minimum temperatures have warmed more rapidly than daytime maximum temperatures. The observed warming has hastened in recent years. The late-20th-century warming has been largely attributed to the increased greenhouse effect. Temperature differences between winter and summer are minor in the tropical region of Australia. However, they are greatest in the southern inland, with seasonal differences along the coast being moderated by the ocean's proximity. In July, a more common latitudinal distribution of average maximums is apparent, ranging from 30 °C near the north coast to below 3 °C in the mountainous areas of the south-east.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Average minimum temperatures in all seasons are highest in northern Australia and near the coastal areas, and are lowest in the elevated areas of the south-east. The highest average January minimum temperatures (near 27 °C) are found near the north-west coast, while in winter they exceed 20 °C at some coastal locations in northern Australia and on the Torres Strait and Tiwi Islands. In the mountains of New South Wales, it is not unusual to have average low minimum temperatures dipping below 5 °C in January and −5 °C in July. Comparatively, most inland (non-mountainous) areas south of the tropics have average July minimum between 0 and 6 °C.


title: Climate of Australia

text: In the desert, the dry air and clear skies give rather large ranges in temperature between day and night. Ranges of 15 °C being typical and 20 °C not quite unusual. Light nighttime frosts in winter occur over much of the southern half of the arid zone, where mean July minimum temperatures are mostly in the 3 to 6 °C range. Moving north, frosts become increasingly rare, with mean July minimum being around 10 °C on the northern boundary.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The highest maximums in Australia are recorded in two regions, the Pilbara and Gascoyne regions of north-western Western Australia and the area extending from south-western Queensland across South Australia into south-eastern Western Australia. Many locations in this region have recorded temperatures exceeding 48 °C. In January, average maximum temperatures exceed 35 °C over a large area of the interior and exceed 40 °C over areas in the north-west. The highest summer maximums in the Pilbara and Gascoyne average at around 41 °C (in some years daily maximums consecutively exceed 40 °C for several weeks at a time).


title: Climate of Australia

text: The most powerful heatwave in the history of south-eastern Australia occurred in January 1939. Adelaide (46.1 °C on the 12th), Melbourne (45.6 °C on the 13th) and Sydney (45.3 °C on the 14th) all had record-high temperatures during this period, as did many other central district areas in New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia. The record number of consecutive days in Melbourne over 40 °C is five, with Brisbane and Sydney each having two. Heatwaves usually bring by oppressively warm nights, with Oodnadatta, SA recording an Australian record of nine nights above 30 °C in February 2004. Another extreme event was a prolonged period of extensive heatwaves known as the Angry Summer in early 2013.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Marble Bar achieved 160 consecutive days above in 1923–24. Nyang had an average maximum of 44.8 °C for the months of February 1998 and January 2005, an Australian record. At the other extreme, average January maximums are near 15 °C on the highest peaks of the south-east ranges and near 20 °C in much of Tasmania. In most of the desert region during summer, cool days are rare and usually associated with major rain events—a rather exceptional example occurred in February 1949, when many areas failed to reach 20 °C on one or more days, and the maximum at Boulia, western Queensland was at 14.4 °C, which was 23 °C below normal.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Many other locations in Australia, except those above 500 metres, have extreme maximums between 43 and 48 °C. Most Tasmanian sites away from the north coast have had extreme maximums between 35 and 40 °C. The lowest extreme maximums are found along the north coast of Tasmania (e.g. 29.5 °C at Low Head) and at high elevations (27.0 °C at Thredbo). While extreme high temperatures are more common inland than they are near the coast, notable extreme maxima have been observed near the coast; 50.7 °C at Onslow, 50.5 °C at Mardie, 49.9 °C at Nullarbor, South Australia, 49.8 °C at Eucla, South Australia and 49.5 °C at Port Augusta, South Australia.


title: Climate of Australia

text: At lower elevations, most inland places south of the tropics have extreme minimum between −3 and −7 °C, and these low temperatures have also occurred in locations within a few kilometres of southern and eastern coasts, such as Sale, Victoria (−5.6 °C), Bega, New South Wales (−8.1 °C), Grove, Tasmania (−7.5 °C) and Taree, New South Wales (−5.0 °C). Many locations in this region have recorded −10 °C or lower, including Gudgenby in the Australian Capital Territory (−14.6 °C) and Woolbrook, New South Wales (−14.5 °C). In the desert, the lowest extreme minimum occur at high elevations, especially around Alice Springs, where the temperature has fallen as low as −7.5 °C.


title: Climate of Australia

text: In the tropics, extreme minimum near or below 0 °C have occurred at many places distant from the coast, as far north as Herberton, Queensland (−5.0 °C). Some locations near tropical coasts, such as Mackay (−0.8 °C), Townsville (0.1 °C) and Kalumburu, Western Australia (0.3 °C) have also recorded temperatures near 0 °C. In contrast, some coastal locations, such as Darwin, have never fallen below 10 °C, and Thursday Island, in the Torres Strait, has an extreme minimum of 16.1 °C. The lowest maximum temperature on record in Australia was , recorded on 9 July 1978 at Thredbo Ski Resort in New South Wales. The highest minimum temperature on record was on 26 January 2019 at Borrona Downs Station near Wanaaring, New South Wales. Before this heatwave, the previous record was , recorded on 24 January 1982 in Arkaroola, South Australia and again on 21 January 2003 in Wittenoom, Western Australia.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Climatic factors contribute to Australia's high incidence of bushfires, particularly during the summer months. Low relative humidity, wind and lack of rain can cause a small fire, either man-made or caused by lightning strikes, to spread rapidly. Low humidity, the heat of the sun and lack of water cause vegetation to dry out becoming a perfect fuel for the fire. High winds fan the flames, increasing their intensity and the speed and distance at which they can travel.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Many of the worst bushfires in eastern Australia, such as the 1983 Ash Wednesday fires, accompany El Niño–Southern Oscillation events which tend to cause a warm, dry and windy climate.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The worst bushfires in Australian history occurred during the 2019–2020 Australian bushfire season, also known as the "Black Summer", which lasted for 6 months and burnt 140,000 km² (55,000 mi²) of land primarily in New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland and the Australian Capital Territory. By the end of the season there had been 14-34 direct human deaths, hundreds of indirect human deaths, 1-3 billion animal deaths and 3,500 homes destroyed.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Prior to this, the worst had been the Black Saturday fires in February to March 2009, causing 173 deaths and destroying over 2000 homes in Victoria.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Though most of Australia is arid or semi-arid, some regions have very significant rainfall. The Wet Tropics in northeast Queensland as well as the western half of Tasmania both average over 1400mm (55in) of rainfall annually, sometimes much higher. As a result the former has some of Australia's only tropical rainforest, while the latter features extensive temperate rainforests where floods can occur at any time.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Through La Niña years the eastern seaboard of Australia (east of the Great Dividing Range) records above-average rainfall, usually creating damaging floods. The 2010–2011 La Niña system broke many rainfall records in Australia, particularly in the states of Queensland and New South Wales, with extensive flooding and major damage to infrastructure and crops. The central east area of Queensland, an area the size of Germany and France combined, was under water in 2010–11. La Nina related flooding has affected major eastern cities such as Sydney, and especially Brisbane. The 2022 eastern Australia floods were also one of the worst recorded flood events.


title: Climate of Australia

text: West of the Great Dividing Range, higher than average rainfall may be related to a negative Indian Ocean Dipole, which sometimes leads to inland flooding, particularly in the Murray-Darling Basin river system and its flood plains and especially during winter.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The Top End, Kimberley and much of North and Far North Queensland are affected by the Australian monsoon (wet season) which brings heavy rain, thunderstorms, tropical cyclones (see below) and frequent flooding from November to April, making many unsealed roads impassable for part of the year. As a result these regions are feature extensive tropical savannah.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Drought in Australia is defined by rainfall over a three-month period being in the lowest ten per cent of amounts having been recorded for that region in the past. This definition takes into account that low rainfall is a relative term and rainfall deficiencies need to be compared to typical rainfall patterns including seasonal variations. Specifically drought in Australia is defined in relation to a rainfall deficiency of pastoral leases and is determined by decile analysis applied to a certain area.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Historical climatic records are now sufficiently reliable to profile climate variability taking into account expectations for regions. State Governments are responsible for declaring a region drought affected and the declaration will take into account factors other than rainfall.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Australia is affected by tropical cyclones which primarily occur between December and April but have occasionally developed in November and May. Cyclones over mainland Australia occur on average five to six times each year. The regions between Broome and Exmouth are most prone to cyclones. Tropical cyclones are known to bring destructive winds, heavy rain with flooding creating storm surges along the coast, causing inundation to low-lying areas. The strongest Australian region cyclone was 2006's Cyclone Monica, with gusts topping . Cyclones can also move inland, decaying to rain depressions, dumping heavy rain and causing flooding.


title: Climate of Australia

text: The worst cyclones of Australia have caused billions of dollars of damage and many deaths. Cyclone Tracy crossed directly over Darwin in 1974, killing 71 persons. It was Australia's most damaging cyclone. Cyclone Mahina in 1899 brought a storm surge to Far North Queensland reaching high, causing 400 deaths and making it the worst natural disaster to befall Australia. Cyclone Larry struck North Queensland and passed over Innisfail in 2006 causing damages estimated at A$1.5 billion. However, there were no deaths in that storm. Cyclone Yasi caused severe flooding and had a total estimated cost of A$3.5 billion making it the second-most costliest cyclone to strike Australia.


title: Climate of Australia

text: Blizzards are not common in mainland Australia, but occur frequently in the Snowy Mountains in New South Wales and Victoria. When blizzards do occur, they can affect the Tasmanian Highlands and, particularly, Mount Wellington, which towers over the Tasmanian capital Hobart. Blizzards do not affect any major towns or cities, because there are no populated areas located in the mountains except for the ski resort towns of New South Wales and Victoria.


title: Climate of Australia

text: A dust storm or sandstorm, a meteorological phenomenon common in arid and semi-arid regions, arises when a gust front passes or when the wind force exceeds the threshold value where loose sand and dust are removed from the dry surface. Particles are transported by saltation and suspension, causing soil erosion from one place and deposition in another.


title: Climate of Australia

text: "Sandstorm" usually refers to dust storms in desert areas when, in addition to fine particles obscuring visibility, a considerable amount of larger sand particles moves closer to the surface. The term "dust storm" is more likely to be used when finer particles are blown long distances, especially when the dust storm affects urban areas.


title: John Milius

text: John Frederick Milius (; born April 11, 1944) is an American screenwriter, film director, and producer. He was a writer for the first two "Dirty Harry" films, received an Academy Award nomination as screenwriter of "Apocalypse Now" (1979), and wrote and directed "The Wind and the Lion" (1975), "Conan the Barbarian" (1982), and "Red Dawn" (1984). He later served as the co-creator of the Primetime Emmy Award-winning television series "Rome" (2005–2007).


title: John Milius

text: Milius was born April 11, 1944, in St. Louis, Missouri, the youngest of three children to Elizabeth Marie ( Roe; 1906–2010) and William Styx Milius (1889–1975), who was a shoe manufacturer. He is Jewish. When Milius was seven, his father sold Milius Shoe Company, which his grandfather George W. Milius had founded in 1923, and retired. He moved the family to Bel Air, California. John Milius became an enthusiastic surfer. At 14, his parents sent him to a small private school, the Lowell Whiteman School, in the mountains of Steamboat Springs, Colorado, because he "was a juvenile delinquent".


title: John Milius

text: Milius became a voracious reader and started to write short stories: "I had learned very early, to write in almost any style. I could write in fluent Hemingway, or in fluent Melville, or Conrad, or Jack Kerouac, and whatever." He says he was also influenced by the oral story telling of surfers at the time, who had a beatnik tradition.


title: John Milius

text: "My religion is surfing", Milius said in 1976, adding that "the other thing that influenced me throughout my youth was my involvement with things Japanese. I studied judo, kendo, and painting. I felt more comfortable with things Japanese and with Japanese people than I did with Europeans ... feudalism in any country, at any period, fascinates me ... I understand the reasoning of people in Asia, it makes sense to me. Zen is very sensible, the whole way of feeling things is logical, whereas many of the Western-motivated things —greed, business sense— I'm not comfortable with, I don't understand their rationale."


title: John Milius

text: Milius says he attempted to join the Marine Corps and volunteer for Vietnam War service in the late 1960s, but was rejected due to a "chronic" and "sometimes disabling" case of mild asthma. "I'd have given anything to be a Marine", said Milius. "As a surfer I'd spent a lot of time hanging out with the Marines off Pendleton, and I'd had every intention of joining up ... I was devastated, I felt like I'd been rejected as a human being." "It was totally demoralizing", he said later. "I missed going to my war. It probably caused me to be obsessed with war ever since." Milius said he was "dying to be able to... go prove myself in battle—the same as all young men long to do, if they are honest with themselves, whether it's right or wrong or even sane, which is a debate that's been going on since we left the caves. Only there was no way I could found my own unit, so I did the second best, which was to write it. Every writer wishes he could actually be doing the thing he writes about." He later admitted, "I don't know how well I'd have done. I really wanted a military career, to be a general, but I had a hard time polishing shoes. And marching. I was in the ROTC once, and I hate marching ... I would have been good in the Mexican Army."


title: John Milius

text: At one stage Milius considered becoming an artist or historian. During a rainy day on a summer vacation in Hawaii in 1962, he stumbled upon a movie theatre showing a week of Akira Kurosawa films and fell in love with cinema.


title: John Milius

text: Milius studied film at the University of Southern California School of Cinema-Television, which he chose because it was an elitist school that trained people for Hollywood. His classmates included George Lucas, Basil Poledouris, Randal Kleiser and Donald F. Glut. Milius says he was influenced by his teacher, Irwin Blacker:


title: John Milius

text: He gave you the screenplay form, which I hated so much, and if you made one mistake on the form, you flunked the class. His attitude was that the least you can learn is the form. "I can't grade you on the content. I can't tell you whether this is a better story for you to write than that, you know? And I can't teach you how to write the content, but I can certainly demand that you do it in the proper form." He never talked about character arcs or anything like that; he simply talked about telling a good yarn, telling a good story. He said, "Do whatever you need to do. Be as radical and as outrageous as you can be. Take any kind of approach you want to take. Feel free to flash back, feel free to flash forward, feel free to flash back in the middle of a flashback. Feel free to use narration, all the tools are there for you to use."


title: John Milius

text: Milius says his writing style was influenced by two novels in particular, "Moby-Dick" and "On the Road":


title: John Milius

text: I think "Moby Dick" is the best work of art ever made ... I used to point out the dramatic entrance of characters, how they were threaded through ... "Moby Dick" was a perfect screenplay, a perfect example of the kind of drama that I was interested in. Another great influence on me was ... "On the Road", which has no tight, linear narrative, but sprawls, following this character. "Moby Dick" and "On the Road" are completely different kinds of novels, yet they're both extremely disciplined. Nothing happens by accident in either of those two books.


title: John Milius

text: Milius reflected his "ambitions stopped at B Westerns ... I thought that was a good life. I never wanted to be Hitchcock or some big mogul, I didn't want to be Louis B. Mayer. I wanted to be ... Budd Boetticher or something ... John Ford."


title: John Milius

text: His short films at film school included "The Reversal of Richard Sun" (1966), "Glut" (1967) and "Viking Women Don't Care" (1967). He wrote a documentary, "The Emperor" (1967), directed by classmate George Lucas, who also edited an animated short Milius directed called "Marcello, I'm So Bored" (1967) with John Strawbridge.


title: John Milius

text: "Marcello", Milius's thesis film, won best animation at the National Student Film Festival and screened around the country in various festivals; it was praised by Vincent Canby of "The New York Times". Milius received a job offer to work in animation but he turned it down as he could not see himself "sitting there drawing cell after cell."


title: John Milius

text: Milius's first completed script was "Los Gringos" (1968). "It actually wasn't bad", he later said. It was sort of like "The Wild Bunch" ... there was a lot of killing and shooting and riding and dust ... sombreros. ... It was a pretty good idea, actually. It had everything, and it was certainly as original as "The Wild Bunch", but it wasn't as skillfully written as later stuff."


title: John Milius

text: He followed this with "The Last Resort" which was optioned by Michael S Laughlin in 1969. Milius says, "Neither of them were ever made, but I was able to option them. I had them rented out for like $5,000 a year."


title: John Milius

text: Milius then got a summer job working at the story department of American International Pictures through a student colleague of his who had begun working there, Willard Huyck. Huyck and Milius worked at AIP under producer Larry Gordon, reading scripts. They eventually collaborated on a rewrite of the screenplay for "The Devil's 8" (1968), an action drama about moonshine drivers which ripped off "The Dirty Dozen" (1968).


title: John Milius

text: Milius's name had been mentioned in a 1968 "Time" magazine article about the new generation of Hollywood filmmakers, which also referred to George Lucas and Martin Scorsese. This was read by Mike Medavoy, who became Milius's agent. Medavoy called Milius "a badboy mad genius in a teenager's body, but he was a good and fast writer with original ideas."


title: John Milius

text: Milius began to get writing commissions. He wrote a script entitled "The Texans" for Al Ruddy at Paramount, a contemporary version of "Red River" (1948) (never made, although Sam Peckinpah was going to direct it in 1979)— Milius later said it "wasn't very good". He also wrote an original called "Truck Driver" (aka "The Haul") which was purchased by Levy-Garner-Laven, although that film too was not made.


title: John Milius

text: Milius later said he "didn't do a good job" with these two early scripts "because in both cases I was influenced by the people who had hired me. They said put this in and put that in, and I went along with it. Every time I went along with something in my whole career it usually didn't work. Usually there's a price to pay. You think of selling out, but there is a price to pay. Usually what people want you to do is make it current."


title: John Milius

text: Milius then wrote "Jeremiah Johnson", a story loosely based on the life of the mountain man Liver-Eating Johnson.


title: John Milius

text: Milius later said this was "the real breaking point" where he knew "almost overnight... that I had become a good writer with a voice.":


title: John Milius

text: I knew that material. I'd lived in the mountains, I had a trapline, I hunted, and I had a lot of experiences with characters up there. So, it was real easy to write that and there was a humor to it, a kind of bigger-than-life attitude. I was inspired by Carl Sandburg. I read a lot of his poetry and it's this kind of abrupt description—"a train is coming, thundering steel, where are you going? Wichita." That great kind of feeling that he had, that's what I was trying to do there. I remember there was a great poem about American braggarts. You know, American liars—"I am the ring-tailed cousin to the such and such that ate so and so and I can do this and I can do that better than Mike Fink the river man ..." I just realized that this was the voice that the script had to have. It was as clear as a bell. I knew that writing was particular to me.


title: John Milius

text: Milius sold the script to Warner Bros. in 1970 for $5,000, going up to $50,000 if it was ever made. Warner Bros. had other writers work on the original script based on "The Crow Killer". Milius was also called back to work on it, and his fee grew each time. (He eventually made $90,000 on the film.) Eventually, Robert Redford agreed to play the lead and Sydney Pollack signed to direct.


title: John Milius

text: Milius wrote an uncredited draft of "Dirty Harry" (1971). He says his contribution to the film was "A lot of guns. And the attitude of Dirty Harry, being a cop who was ruthless. I think it's fairly obvious if you look at the rest of my work what parts are mine. The cop being the same as the killer except he has a badge. And being lonely." "Dirty Harry" was an enormous box office hit.


title: John Milius

text: George Hamilton hired Milius to rewrite "Evel Knievel" (1971), a biopic of the stunt rider, at a fee of $1,000 a day. Milius re-did the entire script over seven days.


title: John Milius

text: He wrote an original script, "The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean", about the famous judge. He offered it for $150,000 if he could direct, but could find no takers. He sold it to First Artists for $300,000, then extremely high for a script. Directed by John Huston and starring Paul Newman, it was a moderate hit, although Milius disliked the final result. "I fought every day", he said. "And I was blooded well. I was treated horribly." More popular was "Jeremiah Johnson".


title: John Milius

text: By now Milius was one of the most sought after screenwriters in Hollywood, seen as a colorful character with a talent for lively interviews. His self-styled "Zen Anarchist"/"American samurai" persona made him stand out in Hollywood. For instance, he only rewrote "Dirty Harry" on the proviso he was given an expensive gun. He was also the inspiration for the character of Big John in the enormously successful "American Graffiti" (1973). Milius said of this film, "I guess he [Lucas] saw me in that light because I was a surfer going past my time."


title: John Milius

text: He also wrote the first draft of the "Dirty Harry" sequel, "Magnum Force" (1973). Milius later said "I don't like "Magnum Force". Of all the films I had anything to do with, I like it least. They changed a lot of things in a cheap and distasteful manner." However, it was successful at the box office.


title: John Milius

text: Milius wanted to move behind the camera. "Being a director is the only way anyone will listen to you in Hollywood", he said. "It's the next best thing to being a star."


title: John Milius

text: Gangster films were popular at the time and AIP offered him the chance to direct one if he would write it for a fraction of his regular fee. Milius agreed and wrote and directed "Dillinger" (1973). "I deliberately chose Dillinger because he was a pure criminal", said Milius. "Robbing banks to right social wrongs did not come into it."


title: John Milius

text: The movie was moderately successful and launched Milius's directing career. He worked on the script for a TV sequel, "" (1974), a pilot for a proposed series about Melvin Purvis (there was a second TV movie, but no series), but did not like the director, Dan Curtis, or the experience of working for TV.


title: John Milius

text: Contemporary film critics grouped Milius in with the emerging "movie brats" generation of filmmakers that also including Lucas, Coppola, Terrence Malick, and Scorsese.


title: John Milius

text: In 1974, David Picker announced he would produce "Ranch Life and the Hunting Trail" directed by Milius and written by Winfred Blevins, about Theodore Roosevelt. The film was never made. Neither was "The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy", a proposed biopic about the famous anti-Communist Senator, which Milius declared interest in making.


title: John Milius

text: Milius next wrote and directed the popular adventure film "The Wind and the Lion" (1975), which starred Sean Connery and Candice Bergen. He later said he felt this was his first "real" movie.


title: John Milius

text: He intended to follow this with "Give Your Heart to the Hawks", a story about mountain man Jedediah Smith in the 1820s based a novel by Winfred Blevins "It's my interpretation of Jedediah Smith, which might not be exactly historical", said Milius. "It'll be about exploration, about the need to see what's over the next ridge and what that does, what price you pay, to find out. Like Dirty Harry, Smith is a classic lone man, with a searing loneliness about him. A leader of men is always alone." It was never made; neither was "Man-Eaters of Kumoan" (1976) based on book by Jim Corbett about a tiger hunter in India which Milius worked on.


title: John Milius

text: He did come close to making "Extreme Prejudice", based on his script, in 1976. However he decided to make "Big Wednesday" instead; "Extreme Prejudice" would be made a decade later, much rewritten, and directed by Walter Hill.


title: John Milius

text: In 1975, Milius formed his own production company, The A Team, with Buzz Feitshans, who had edited "Dillinger". They had a five-year deal with Warner Bros.. Milius said, "Our motto is Civitas Sine Prudentia, which really translates to Social Irresponsibility; I believe in it. It's refreshing, it's liberating. Americans are basically socially irresponsible ... Who else would have invented the atomic bomb quite the same way? The Nazis would have invented it with the desire to conquer the world; we were the only people that could have invented it with the desire not to conquer the world"


title: John Milius

text: Its first production was an autobiographical surfing picture, "Big Wednesday" (1978), which he called "a surfing "How Green Was My Valley"". This was a major commercial disappointment although it has gone on to be a cult film. Milius's friendship with George Lucas saw him given a percentage of the profits for "Star Wars", which Mike Medavoy estimated earned Milius $1.5 million—in exchange Milius gave Lucas a percentage of the profits for "Big Wednesday" which amounted to virtually nothing.


title: John Milius

text: In 1979, Milius said "the ultimate aim of the A Team is that it will become a company that makes lots of projects. I shall be the figurehead and the father figure and take a percentage and I won't have to do anything except go off and direct my movie once every three years."


title: John Milius

text: The A Team made a number of movies not directed by Milius. Notably, they produced the first three films from Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale: "I Wanna Hold Your Hand", "1941" (directed by Steven Spielberg), and "Used Cars". He also produced "Hardcore", directed by friend Paul Schrader.


title: John Milius

text: Schrader once described Milius's writing as containing too many good lines and scenes. He says Warren Beatty once "told John something I've been telling him too: 'You come too soon and you come too often.'... He's so full of juice he just can't stop coming, rather than holding back and tightening the situation and building characters. That releasing diffuses the energy, the characters are too broad because they never have time to build up the inner strength."


title: John Milius

text: Milius says he was offered $17,000 to rewrite "Skin Game" (1971) but then Francis Ford Coppola made a competing offer of $15,000 for Milius to write "Apocalypse Now". "Apocalypse Now" was an adaptation of "Heart of Darkness" set in the Vietnam War which George Lucas intended to direct as a follow up to his first feature "THX 1138" (1971). Milius says Coppola:


title: John Milius

text: Offered that wonderful fork in the road where I could go do my own thing rather than just rewrite some piece of crap that would probably be rewritten by somebody else. That was the most important decision I made in my life as a writer. That sort of steered me onto the path of doing my own work and being a little more like a novelist ... I tackled an unpopular subject that no one was going to make a movie about where the chances were really slim that I could pull it off. There was no book, nothing but me and the blank page. And that was wonderful because I had followed my heart. One of the nicest times in my life was writing "Apocalypse Now."


title: John Milius

text: The commercial failure of "THX 1138" delayed production plans for "Apocalypse Now". Milius later said of the "Apocalypse Now" script, "No one would touch it because of the Vietnam War. Everyone loved it, it did more for my career than any other script because it was always considered a work of genius; from the minute it came out, it really stirred people up. It's a good script, it's certainly no work of genius. It churns people up, and that's what they think works of genius are supposed to do."


title: John Milius

text: However, the following year saw the release of "Apocalypse Now", directed by Francis Ford Coppola. Coppola rewrote the script, which Milius disliked. "He wanted to ruin it, liberalize it, and turn it into "Hair"", said Milius in 1976. "He sees himself as a great humanitarian, an enlightened soul who will tell you such wonderful things as he does at the end of "Godfather 2" -- that crime doesn't pay ... Talent-wise, he's no John Ford; character-wise, he's no Steve Spielberg. Francis can't stand to have any other creative influence around ... Francis Coppola has this compelling desire to save humanity when the man is a raving fascist, the Bay Area Mussolini."


title: John Milius

text: Milius's old agent, Mike Medavoy, helped establish Orion Pictures in 1978 and one of their first movies was going to be "East of Suez", written and directed by Milius. It was not made.


title: John Milius

text: Spielberg said in 1978 that Milius was key to the group of young filmmakers known as the New Hollywood, which included himself, Lucas, and Coppola:


title: John Milius

text: John is our Scoutmaster. He's the one who will tell you to go on a trip and only take enough food, enough water for one day, and make you stay out longer than that. He's the one who says, "Be a man. I don't want to see any tears." He's a terrific raconteur, a wonderful story teller. John has more life than all the rest of us put together.


title: John Milius

text: Milius enjoyed his greatest commercial success as a director with "Conan the Barbarian" (1982), which made a star of Arnold Schwarzenegger.


title: John Milius

text: Two years later, this was followed by the popular action film, "Red Dawn" (1984) which was the first film to be rated PG-13.


title: John Milius

text: He helped produce "Uncommon Valor" (1983) and acted as "spiritual adviser" for "Lone Wolf McQuade" (1983). He wrote and directed an episode for "The New Twilight Zone" (1985) and a story of his, "Viking Bikers from Hell", was used in an episode of "Miami Vice" (season 3, episode 22).


title: John Milius

text: In 1986, it was reported that he was writing the script for "Fatal Beauty" which he hoped to direct with Cher; the film was made by Tom Holland and starred Whoopi Goldberg.


title: John Milius

text: In the late 1980s Milius wrote and directed a Pacific War adventure film "Farewell to the King" (1989). This flopped at the box office. In 1989, he tried to get funding for adaptations of Allan W. Eckert's "The Frontiersmen: A Narrative", about settling the Ohio River Valley, and "Half of the Sky", about a Rocky Mountains explorer.


title: John Milius

text: Sean Connery was hired to star in the film "The Hunt for Red October" for producer Mace Neufeld, based on the Tom Clancy's novel of the same name. Connery thought the script was "too American" and insisted Neufeld hire John Milius to rewrite the Russian sequences. Connery thought with Milius, he could "get a different sort of image, different speech patterns."


title: John Milius

text: Neufeld then hired Milius to write and direct "Flight of the Intruder", based on the book by Stephen Coonts. It too was not a financial success.


title: John Milius

text: "I think the culture had changed and that is why my films were less accepted", he reflected later. "I still think those are also great films, "Farewell to the King" especially."


title: John Milius

text: In 1992, Milius claimed that he was blacklisted for his conservative beliefs in liberal Hollywood, saying that his flops were not as forgiven as those from more leftist directors. "It weighs ten times heavier against me", he said. "If you don't share the politically correct vision, then you are an outlaw, you are hunted and there is a price on your head, and if they catch you they will hang you."


title: John Milius

text: The film of "Hunt for the Red October" had been a big success, however, and Milius remained in high demand as a screenwriter: he did several drafts of another Clancy adaptation, "Clear and Present Danger" (1994), which was another hit.


title: John Milius

text: Milius worked on a number on unfilmed scripts, including "Bad Iron", a biker movie written by Kent Anderson, which he intended to produce. He was going to direct a film about Alexander the Great starring Jean-Claude Van Damme but that was put on hold when a miniseries on the same topic was made by Italian TV. He wrote "Harlot's Ghost", for Francis Ford Coppola, based on a novel by Norman Mailer; Milius described it as "a cross between "The Godfather" and "Apocalypse Now." It's about families and duplicity and danger, but this time provoked by the government."


title: John Milius

text: He adapted the Sgt. Rock comics for producer Joel Silver, with either Renny Harlin and Paul Verhoeven attached at certain points respectively. And also wrote a version of "Die Hard 3", co-written with Barry Beckerman. In the early 1990s he wrote "Texas Rangers", about the establishment of that organization, for Frank Price at Columbia. He hoped to direct the film, but could not raise the funding.


title: John Milius

text: In 1993, he replaced Andrei Konchalovsky as director on "The Northmen" for Morgan Creek Productions, about an English monk who gets captured by a band of Vikings. "This was inevitable", Milius said of his directing a Viking film. "I've been a practicing pagan for a long time. "Conan the Barbarian" was really a Viking movie but it was disguised." However, financing fell through. He was going to direct an adaptation of Tom Clancy's novel "Without Remorse" with Gary Sinise and Laurence Fishburne, but the project folded in 1995, two weeks before shooting was to commence due to the financial collapse of Savoy Pictures.


title: John Milius

text: In 2000, Milius was hired to work as a creative consultant with the Institute for Creative Technologies to pre-visualize the challenges to peace that America will face and the advanced virtual reality technologies necessary to train U.S. troops for the future. "Through his enormous body of work, John has shown a deep understanding of the human condition and the ways that conflict can be resolved", said ICT executive director Richard Lindheim. "Furthermore our efforts will benefit greatly from his vision of the world in the near future, and the techniques and procedures that will be needed to maintain security."


title: John Milius

text: That year he also wrote two biopics: "Le May" for Robert Zemeckis, about Curtis LeMay; and "Manila John", about John Basilone, which he was going to make for HBO. Warner Bros. wanted him to update "Dirty Harry" and he wanted them to fund a version of "The Iliad"; there was also talk he would make "The Alamo" for HBO.


title: John Milius

text: In the early 2000s he worked on "King Conan: Crown of Iron" (2001−02), a sequel to "Conan the Barbarian".


title: John Milius

text: He also developed "Jornada del Muerto" ("Journey of Death") (2003), a biker film starring Triple H and wrote a pilot for a TV show for UPN, "Delta", about a military special ops team that takes on terrorists. None of these movies were made.