New Zealand Spring Weather

[J07]

You can get GFS charts on www.weatheronline.co.nz for the NZ region, it's pretty good.

October is over and it was very sunny. Nelson almost beat the all-time October sunshine record for any location but not quite! They were also very dry.

Average maximum of 19C, 296 hours of sunshine (9.5 hours a day), 7mm of rain....not bad for the middle of Spring.

There was some seriously cold weather mid month, with some Northland towns only seeing maxima of 12C!

Spectacularly sunny and very dry in most areas

• Rainfall: Extremely dry in Nelson and northern and western parts of the North Island. Very wet in Gisborne and Hawkes Bay. Rather dry elsewhere.
• Sunshine: Spectacularly sunny, with many records broken.
• Temperatures: Near average temperatures for many regions. Cooler than usual for the east coast of the North Island, as well as parts of Buller, The Sounds, and near Kaitaia. Warmer than average in the southwest South Island.

Overall, October 2010 was extremely sunny and very dry in most regions. More anticyclones (‘highs’) covered New Zealand than is typical for the time of year, resulting in a rather settled climate during the month. The exceptions were an extremely cold southerly event which affected the country on the 11th and 12th, and a subsequent wet period for the east coast of the North Island between the 13th and 15th.
October rainfall was more than double normal (at least 200 percent) in Gisborne and Hawkes Bay. But for the remainder of the country, it was very dry, reflecting the prevalence of anticyclones. Rainfalls were well below average (less than 40 percent of normal) across much of the North Island (excluding the east coast). It was the driest October in Nelson since records began in 1941, with less than 10 percent of normal rainfall. Elsewhere in the South Island it was rather dry, with rainfall between 50 and 80 percent of normal, except for Southland, which experienced closer to normal rainfall. By the end of October, larger than normal soil moisture deficits had developed in much of Northland, coastal Nelson, mid Canterbury, and North Otago.
Sunshine totals were well above average (more than 125 percent of normal) across most of the South Island, and the north and west of the North Island. Many October sunshine records were broken. It was the sunniest October since records began at Kaitaia, Te Kuiti, Taumarunui, Takaka and Nelson, Timaru, Dunedin, and Balclutha. Sunshine totals were also slightly up for the eastern North Island (with sunshine totals between 100 and 115 percent of normal), despite the much higher than normal October rainfall there.
Extremely cold temperatures affected the country on the 11th and 12th, followed by unusually warm spells on the 16th and 30th. Even with the extreme swings in temperature, monthly mean temperatures were near average (within 0.5°C of average) for much of the country. The exceptions were above average temperatures recorded in the southwest of the South Island (between 0.5°C and 1.2°C above average), and below average temperatures (between 0.5°C and 1.2°C below average) in Gisborne, Hawkes Bay, the Wairarapa, parts of Buller, the Sounds, and around Kaitaia. The New Zealand national average temperature was 11.7°C (0.5°C below the 1971–2000 October average).
Further Highlights:

• The highest temperature recorded was 28.4°C, recorded at Waiau on the 16th.
• The lowest temperature recorded was -4.4°C, recorded at Hanmer on the 12th.
• The highest 1-day rainfall was 151 mm recorded at Patutahi (Gisborne) on the 13th (a new record there).
• The highest wind gust was 159 km/hr, recorded at Puysegur Point on the 16th (a near-record there).
• Of the six main centres, Tauranga was the warmest, Wellington the wettest, and Christchurch the coolest and driest. All of the main centres except Wellington were extremely sunny, but Tauranga and Christchurch topped the group, recording 246 and 245 hours of bright sunshine, respectively.

http://www.niwa.co.nz/our-science/climate/publications/all/cs/monthly/climate-summary-for-october-2010

[Thundery wintry showers]

Where abouts can you view GFS charts for NZ/Australasia TWS? I've looked around a bit but can't find anything remotely comparable to the netweather chart viewer or wetterzentrale??

Apologies for not getting back to you earlier. The GFS charts that J07 mentioned are here:

http://www.weatheronline.co.nz/cgi-bin/expertcharts?LANG=nz&MENU=0000000000&CONT=nznz&MODELL=gfs&MODELLTYP=1&BASE=-&VAR=pslv&HH=78&ZOOM=0&ARCHIV=0&WMO=&PERIOD=0

Personally I use the Southern Hemisphere GFS charts on Wetterzentrale, they aren't ideal but you can make out New Zealand's pressure patterns. "Australien" also provides charts for New Zealand but NZ is on the far-right side of the map, so I don't find those as useful.

You can also get a synoptic chart archive here:

http://www.bom.gov.au/australia/charts/archive/index.shtml

It focuses on Australia but New Zealand isn't relegated to the far-side of the map, so it works quite well as a New Zealand chart archive also.

[J07]

6PM yesterday in Christchurch:

NZCH 040500Z 33016KT CAVOK 23/07 Q1002

4PM today in Christchurch:

NZCH 050300Z 21020KT 5000 RA BKN008 BKN015 09/09 Q1008

Now guess which day Hillary Clinton decided to visit

[J07]

The weather has been quite boring for the last few weeks. Both islands saw their first official 30C maxima of the year this week, with the South Island winning by a few days. The highest temperature so far this month is 31C in Blenheim. In rather typical La Nina fashion, warm and humid weather has been afflicting the northern part of the North Island. Dewpoints of 20C have been experienced over the last few days in Bay of Plenty, Auckland and Northland. A fresher change has worked its way through now.

High pressure remains in control throughout the coming week. Warm weather should spill onto the east of the South Island by the end of the week, with 30C likely again.

So it's basically like an early start to summer, and the pattern seems unlikely to budge much until April although I expect we are not far from getting decent subtropical lows and ex cyclones hitting the North Island, bringing lots of rain.

8PM yesterday in Auckland:

NZAA 200700Z 03006KT 210V180 9999 SCT020 20/18 Q1012 TEMPO 6000

RADZ BKN014 =

2PM today in Auckland:

NZAA 210100Z 22020KT 9999 BKN040 17/08 Q1012 NOSIG =

Two quite different days there.