MetService Red Heavy Rain Warning For Auckland

At 9pm Friday 27 January – after consultation with Auckland Emergency Services – MetService upgraded their Orange Warning to a Red Heavy Rain Warning for the Auckland area. This warning is in place until 3am Saturday 28 January. A Severe Thunderstorm Watch is still in place until 8am Saturday 28 January and maybe extended at 10am issue of all severe weather warnings.

Throughout Friday evening MetService issued a number of Severe Thunderstorm Warnings for Auckland region warning of downpours of 80mm per hour. Auckland Airport recorded 71mm in one hour between 8-9pm and the international terminal was flooded causing further delays at Auckland Airport.

There was major flooding on Friday evening across the region with many roads closed including the state highways, there were evacuations, and a state of emergency was declared. Police and fire services along with emergency management were inundated by calls from the public.

This extreme event has been caused by warm air descending from the Tropics bring this heavy rain feature with embedded thunderstorms.

Lisa Murray, Head of Weather Communications says, “While you may not have heard any thunder it was the long band of thunderstorms that produced the downpours of torrential rain which exacerbation the severe situation.”

MetService’s forecasters had been warning Aucklanders of the potential heavy rain from Thursday ahead of the Anniversary weekend with the worst of the weather turning up on Friday night.

“Until now, Auckland’s wettest January was in 1986 with 206mm, but already in January 2023 we have had an extraordinary 320mm of rain at Auckland Airport. In addition, it looks like Auckland is having its wettest month ever since records began! Even beating July 1998 when 304mm was recorded for that month,” says Lisa.

MetService Red Warnings are only issued for the most significant weather events. This is the first red warning of 2023. Along with the Auckland Red Warning there are a number of orange warnings and watches across the North Island and Marlborough Sounds.

The next weather warning update to metservice.com and the weather app will be at 10am on Saturday 28 January. Keep up to date with the forecasts at MetService.com.

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