AUSTRALIA is well on track to records its second hottest year since records began after having recorded its hottest six months ever according to the Bureau of Meteorology.

In a scary thought for Victorians after its Black Saturday bushfires, it is expected to be even hotter in January and February than last year.

The World Meteorological Organisation’s annual climate statement released today at Copenhagen found temperatures in 2009 reached 0.44 degrees above the 1961-1990 annual average.

Climate change is alive.

 ”The decade 2000-2009 is very likely to be the warmest on record,” WMO secretary general Michel Jarraud told reporters at the Copenhagen climate summit late on Tuesday, Australian time.

Australia was singled out for its wild weather in 2009. “Australia had the third-warmest year on record with three exceptional heatwaves,” Mr Jarraud said.

 The WMO report said the heatwaves happened in January/February, when the hot weather contributed to the disastrous Victorian bushfires, in August and again in November.

The presence of El Nino conditions underway in the Pacific saw near-record rises in sea surface temperatures and most parts of Australia experienced an exceptionally mild winter.

Maximum temperatures were also well above the national average, with 3.2 degrees above normal, the largest ever recorded in any month.

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