Frost Reports 2024

[Orion]

Was -0.8°C at 6am here, but +0.8°C by 7:40am.

Cars and rooves were white, also frost on lawn and the tops of small shrubs.

[Storm Struck]

You certainly know its a severe frost when you pour Luke warm water on the windscreen and it re freezes.
That land breeze westerly has warmed up the plains fairly smartly this morning.

Excuse me if this is a fair question or not, but would it be wise to break it down into what part of the month the records occurred?
For example a record of -6.4C might have occurred after the 20th of May rather than the 10th.
Which of course you would expect more so being closer to winter.
In other words breaking it down less than the monthly record

[midgrove]

-4.7 here, lowest since my weather station installed late 2022. Strangely that was colder than Woodbourne (Blenheim Aiport)
which is 6km inland from Blenheim. 8 degree ground frost on the old max/min thermometer

[Orion]

...
Excuse me if this is a fair question or not, but would it be wise to break it down into what part of the month the records occurred?
For example a record of -6.4C might have occurred after the 20th of May rather than the 10th.
Which of course you would expect more so being closer to winter.
In other words breaking it down less than the monthly record

Purely subjective: it seems to me that the weather for any given date, year to year, is about the same within 2 weeks either way.
So a 4-week window.
Just my instinct and non-technical observations.

[Nev]

...
Excuse me if this is a fair question or not, but would it be wise to break it down into what part of the month the records occurred?
For example a record of -6.4C might have occurred after the 20th of May rather than the 10th.
Which of course you would expect more so being closer to winter.
In other words breaking it down less than the monthly record

Agree that Chch Aero's near record of -6.3C this morning is indeed remarkable for being so early in the month. It's also only the 3rd time it has gone below -5.0C in May (the other 2 being -6.4C on 29 May 2015 and -5.3C on 26 May 2001) from records since 1954. And while temps in the minus 3's might be a little more common in early May, its earliest temp in the minus 4's was -4.2C on 18 May 1958.

I also think that NZ's first real cold wintry storms don't usually occur until the last quarter of May. So if I were to redefine our seasons, I'd have our winter starting around the 23rd of May...

[Richard]

Here's a list of NIWA's coldest temps this morning:

-7.7˚C Medbury (Canterbury) [2nd coldest May temperature on record since records began in 1927]

Note that records at their Medbury site actually began in 2016, so their claim that 'records began in 1927' must be based on a combination of older sites in that general area.

The only site that I can think in the general area that is likely going back to around 1927 would be Culverden, even then what year was this site setup?.

[NZ Thunderstorm Soc]

Down to minus 2.7C here this morning but by 7am, it was above zero, so not as severe here as what i expected. All traces gone by 9am.

[tgsnoopy]

Received a call from my power company warning of possible power network failure due to load on the network either tonight or tomorrow morning due to the cold snap. I’m in Christchurch.

Thought it eas nice they called.

*%*#^ Electric cars taking all the power eh

[Nev]

Here's a list of NIWA's coldest temps this morning:
...
Note that records at their Medbury site actually began in 2016, so their claim that 'records began in 1927' must be based on a combination of older sites in that general area.

The only site that I can think in the general area that is likely going back to around 1927 would be Culverden, even then what year was this site setup?.

The nearest historic sites to you are 'Balmoral Forest' (5.1 km ENE), with records from 1928 to 1991, and 'Balmoral' (5.3 km N), with records from 1927 to 1949. 'Balmoral' apparently recorded -8.3C on 24 May 1949, although that looks very suspect, particularly with 'Balmoral Forest' only recording -3.3C that same day.

And yes, 'Culverden' (17.7 km NE), with records from 1983 to 2005, and MS's current 'Culverden AWS' (20.4 km NE), with records from 2009, may have been used to fill the gaps since then.

There's also 'Hawarden 2' (5.4 km SW), but only has records from 1978 to 1982, and 'Balmoral East CWS' (13.1 km ENE), with current records from 2017 (the latter recording -6.9C this morning).

So, disregarding the dodgy -8.3C at 'Balmoral' on 24 May 1949 would make Medbury's -7.7C this morning the lowest May temp ever recorded in your area from records since 1927.

[Richard]

Thanks Nev,

Technically yes, that is right being the second lowest May recorded temp since 1927 in this area, but those sites are not the Medbury site, they should have written it as within the district/location.area or what ever. But really, its totally meaningless anyway when there's been no continuous recording site since that year, there's too many years of missing data.

Anyway, a light frost this morning here with a temperature of +0.6

[NZ Thunderstorm Soc]

Another frost here this morning, down to minus 0.9C.

[Orion]

Light frost on roofs and cars this morning but air temp. did not quite go below 0°C.

[NZ Thunderstorm Soc]

Another frost this morning with white on the lawn and neighbour's roof. Down to minus 0.5C

[Orion]

Temp stayed above 0°C here this morning, but roofs in the lee of the NW breeze were rimed over at 7:45am.
Was around 3.9°C then.

[Richard]

Got down to -2.1deg here this morning

[Richard]

Reached -3deg at 5.00 am before the cloud move over

[Richard]

Sitting on -4.2deg atm with the sun now shining, shouldn't go any lower.

[NZ Thunderstorm Soc]

White on roofs and lawns here this morning, down to minus 1.7C.

[Orion]

White on roofs and lawns this morning but stayed at just above 0°C

[Richard]

The lowest it reached this morning was -1.5deg before the high cloud drifted over

[NZ Thunderstorm Soc]

Down to zero this morning but there was frost on the lawn and truck window,

[NZ Thunderstorm Soc]

Light frosting on lawn and truck window. Down to minus 0.1C.

[Richard]

Another cold one this morning with -4.4deg

[Orion]

Exactly 0.0°C on my thermometer at the moment.
Sky clear, lawn white.

[Kobi]

Frost was visible on the ground, roof and car windows this morning at my house, but only dropped down to 0c at the airport station, dont know about other stations around the city though