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Australia Australia Waterfall

Malanda Falls

A 4 m drop.

When to go

Malanda Falls, 2016
Kerry Raymond · CC BY 4.0

In numbers.

4m

Height

1.4m³/s

Average flow

estimate

Jan–Apr

Best months

54kW

Water power

estimate

The water at Malanda Falls, month by month

It roars from February to March.

The fullest months: from February to March. The thinnest: from June to November.

  1. 2.4 m³/sJan
  2. 3.5 m³/sFeb
  3. 3.8 m³/sMar
  4. 2.6 m³/sApr
  5. 1.5 m³/sMay
  6. 0.8 m³/sJun
  7. 0.5 m³/sJul
  8. 0.3 m³/sAug
  9. 0.2 m³/sSep
  10. 0.3 m³/sOct
  11. 0.5 m³/sNov
  12. 1.0 m³/sDec
high water best months to go

From about 0.18 m³/s in the lowest month to 3.8 m³/s in the highest. Best months to go, with plenty of water and pleasant days: from January to April.

Estimate: the timing comes from rain, snowmelt and evaporation (NASA POWER, 1991–2020); the amounts from the river model of HydroATLAS (WaterGAP, 1971–2000). Dams upstream can change the real flow.

Waterfall in Far North Queensland, Australia

Malanda Falls is a waterfall in Australia. The water falls 4 m over a front 30 m wide.

Read more on Wikipedia

Getting there.

Plan your visit

Stay, explore and get there

Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.

How big is it?

How big it really is.

4.0 mMalanda Falls1.8 ma person9.0 ma house

Height of the drop from Wikidata. Buildings and the person are drawn at the same scale.

54 kW

About 1.4 m³/s falling 4 m: the power of the water as it drops.

  • enough to power about 13 homes, if it were all turned into electricity

Power of falling water = density × gravity × flow × height. Average flow and height as shown above; an estimate.

Seen from the sky.

8 × 8 km of cloud-free satellite image, with what OpenStreetMap knows around the falls.

Malanda Falls seen from above (Sentinel-2) N 2 km

Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 (EOX, CC BY 4.0), 8 × 8 km, north up. Points © OpenStreetMap contributors.

The Johnstone River through the falls
730 m740 m750 mMalanda Falls-0.5 km0+0.5 km+1 km← upstreamdownstream →

The line follows the river as mapped in OpenStreetMap; heights from the 30 m Copernicus model, which smooths narrow drops — the published height of the falls is the one above.

What is around.

  • 3viewpoints
  • —waymarked walking routes
  • 2car parks
  • —swimming spots
  • —picnic sites
  • 3toilets
  • 1information boards and visitor centres
  • —bus stops within 1 km
  • —other named waterfalls within 4 km
  • —caves
  • 1campsitesMalanda Falls Caravan Park
  • 1hotels, B&Bs and huts within 6 kmMt Quincan Crater Retreat
  • 2restaurants and cafés within 3 km

Counted in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit, up to 2 km around the falls (unless noted). A low number may just mean nobody has mapped it yet. © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).

Towns nearby

  • Malanda1.0 km in a straight line
  • Yungaburra9.4 km in a straight line
  • Atherton15 km in a straight line
  • Tolga22 km in a straight line

Weather

The weather, month by month.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Afternoon °C262624232120202124262828
Night °C192019171513121214161719
Rain & snow (mm)328377365194113666034336389166
Wet days232322201611109791218
Sun h/day6.96.66.36.66.46.16.87.99.19.39.18.4

Long-term averages 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) for a cell about 55 km wide, with temperatures carried to the height of the falls (753 m) at −6.5 °C per 1,000 m. Not a forecast.

Photos

Through visitors' eyes.

Malanda Falls 2, Queensland
Joshua Tagicakibau · CC BY-SA 4.0
Malanda Mosaic
Drashokk · CC BY-SA 4.0
Malanda Falls QUT-7304-1
Jack Bain · CC BY 4.0

Recent years

Wet years and dry years

Rain of each month as a share of the 1991–2020 average. A wet season above 100 % usually means a fuller waterfall.

JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
202074%56%27%25%73%31%33%17%86%5%29%87%
2021125%61%48%168%32%62%40%96%41%9%85%62%
202285%27%61%135%89%31%119%47%47%99%93%119%
2023100%79%62%38%21%46%109%124%81%27%7%221%
202472%59%102%80%52%19%49%89%45%24%31%177%
202570%83%97%22%48%14%16%22%286%71%51%151%

130% wetter than usual 70% drier than usual

Compare with the waterfalls nearby.

Malanda Falls

Australia

  • 4 mHeight
  • 1.4 m³/sAverage flow
  • Jan–AprBest months

Dinner Falls

Australia

  • —Height
  • 0.47 m³/sAverage flow
  • Jan–AprBest months

See the guide

Millaa Millaa Falls

Australia

  • 18 mHeight
  • —Average flow
  • Jan–AprBest months

See the guide

Tinaroo Falls

Australia

  • —Height
  • 18 m³/sAverage flow
  • Jan–AprBest months

See the guide

About these numbers

Names, height, width, riverWikidata (Q11008122) · CC0
River flow and catchmentHydroATLAS / RiverATLAS v1.0 (Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0
ClimateNASA POWER, 1991–2020
Relief, river profile, 3D modelCopernicus DEM GLO-30 · © DLR e.V., © Airbus Defence and Space GmbH, Copernicus/ESA
Paths, viewpoints, parking© OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL
ImagesEOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons

Every figure is an average, an estimate or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.

The family

Do you prefer beaches, lakes, mountains, waterfalls, islands, rivers or canyons?

Same idea, other landscapes: field atlases built on open data, month by month, in seven languages.