A Weather Traffic Jam in the Tasman

MetService News Release
26 Sept 2016

A Weather Traffic Jam in the Tasman

A strong high pressure over Australia and another over the ocean to the southeast of New Zealand are causing a traffic jam of weather features in the Tasman Sea. Sandwiched between these two high pressures, the country is covered with wind from the northeast bringing moisture laden air. This means cloud and rain, especially for those areas first hit by the wind as it comes down from the subtropics.

This week sees a continuation of this northeast flow over New Zealand, with Gisborne and Hawke’s Bay having a cloudy, wet week. This flow also brings cloud and showers to many other places with some heavy thundery falls possible over the top half of the North Island on Wednesday. For the main centres of the South Island the cloud, especially morning and night, is the main player for this week’s weather, with just a chance of a few showers or drizzle.

“Areas like Coromandel Peninsula are already saturated from the rain over the weekend, so continuing showers could cause some surface flooding as water struggles to drain away”, said Communications Meteorologist Lisa Murray.

The WeatherScape image above shows the rainfall accumulations in the northeast flow from today (Monday) until Thursday 12pm.

There is hope for the school holidays later in the week, with an improving trend to the weather. Murray advises parents, “It is best to have a few indoor school holiday activities up your sleeve this week, and be at the ready to go outdoors when you get the chance. Friday looks likely to be the best bet for the main centres”.

Looking to the weekend, weather models are indicating a low pressure trough moving over the country, which will mean wind, rain and cloud. So keep up to date with the latest forecasts to get the most up to date information. This can be found at metservice.com or on mobile devices at m.metservice.com. You can also follow our updates on MetService TV, at MetService New Zealand on Facebook, @metservice and @MetServiceWARN on Twitter and at blog.metservice.com

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