NZ Weather Forum

Manukau heads observer wrote:50mm here now, to 5:45 am, and still raining nicely
great xmas present for the farmers in the district!

Geepers! 33mm here so far to 7:20am and 42mm at Grey Lynn...

37.8 mm so far @horsham downs, quite heavy over here to.

My digital rain gauge is reporting 50mm in the last 24 hours - now that's a good soaking! It's rather cold though

Edit: Manual gauge has recorded 51mm, so a good agreement of how much rain fell between the gauges.

ive got an impromptu stream running through my back yard

Here in Laingholm we've recorded 81mm rain for the 14hrs to 0730 this morning - making this comfortably one of our more significant rainfall events of the year.

55mm here total

sounds like for some parts of the auckland area, it was a missed forecast heavy rain event?

yes, the largest fall of rain since the winter months,,,,it was a relatively dry spring..

sounds like for some parts of the auckland area, it was a missed forecast heavy rain event?

On reflection it was a strong system with subtropical moisture so we should have picked the rain event. I was looking at the surface based instability with this and not too much else. Looks to be another potential rainfall event early next week.

reports in of 80mm on the west coast here

High cloud is thickening here this morning, so we must be catching some of the low system.
Wouldnt be surprised to see a few splashes or rain this evening, as the top half of the south island is meant to get a swipe from the low briefly.
NE was keen last night fresh and gusty at times, but i dont think it was anything stronger than 40kmh Mark.
For some reason GFS is giving me runs out for the start of January, playing up abit and not giving me my 500mb temps on the runs.
It likes the idea of significant rainfall from 5th January but thats a fair way out, thats next year xmas is still coming in less than a day see what i just did there .
Nice to hear eastern North Island areas benefiting from this low system as they missed the last one which got us.
Cheers
Jason.

looks like there was some solid rain last night. That will make the farmers happy. Dad said to me the other day it was starting to go dry and solid rain was needed.

With the weather station there the rain gauge has not been correlated 100% yet. Will and i just estimated how far to screw back in the screws. But i have been keeping track of it against the EW Hamilton gauge and it seems to be very similar. When i get back ill tinker with it and put a manual one next to it so i can get it spot on.

Wind is still stop start on it because we are waiting on the wireless repeater but when it is working there are some good gusts so i cant wait to get it running properly and see some really good gusts.

Here's a few 'Official' 24hr Obs to 9am this morn...

18.2 mm - Kaitaia Hospital
52.2 mm - Bay of Islands (Purerua)
62.6 mm - Kaikohe
66.6 mm - Whangarei Airport
59.0 mm - Dargaville
48.2 mm - Warkworth
41.4 mm - Whangaparaoa
68.5 mm - Kumeu
67.0 mm - Khyber Pass (cen Ak)
63.6 mm - Mangere
57.8 mm - Auckland Airport
64.4 mm - Pukekohe
47.6 mm - Hamilton Airport

EDIT: Added some belated figures for Khyber Pass, Kumeu and Kaikohe.

there is an online station on the west coast here that recorded 56mm....which is more in line with what I recorded,and other sites in the general area
(not sure who owns the station,maybe NIWA)
people have just a wedge type rain gauge, the readings are often too high (re the 80mm I have been reported)but though in a easterly type flow, the western hills do get more rain generaly (and you can see the rain is heavier out to the west on the rain radar (lee trough sort of thing)

I had originally been expecting the most rain in the Auckland area to fall in the eastern suburbs after indications by metservice that the bulk of the rain would affect eastern Northland and the Coromandel. I guess the rain was further west than anticipated, as Coromandel ended up with less than Auckland!

getting a surprisingly heavy shower line coming through here at the moment.....with that left over moisture from the low/left behind trough line sort of thing...

Brief drizzle in Akaroa about 4pm - must be the outer edge of the rainband. Otherwise just cloudy on BP today with a fresh northeasterly.

Think the Metservice have made a big mistake with the issue of the wettest place in last hour being Le Bons Bay with 27.2mm in the last hour! hahaha no way! There isnt even anything near there on the radar. Wonder how they managed to do that

Thats metservice for you they never want to use anyones weather station readings do they?
Got 1mm of rain last night seemed to have stopped.

Think the Metservice have made a big mistake with the issue of the wettest place in last hour being Le Bons Bay with 27.2mm in the last hour! hahaha no way! There isnt even anything near there on the radar. Wonder how they managed to do that

Probably a typo - they probably meant 2.7mm. Even that seems like too much - cloudy this morning out on Banks peninsula, but drizzle only just begun where I am. (west side of Akaroa Harbour)

There has been a few light showers out here this morning with one steady one, and 1.4mm in the gauge.
Anyone camping in the Nelson and Buller ranges today will sure be roughing it out, according to MS rainfall rates with a high risk for T storms of up to near 30mm/ hour.
Low risk tomorrow i would think with showers developing about the foothills spreading eastwards in the evening briefly.
Right now to begin filling the stomach with xmas food .
Cheers
Jason.

Cool and overcast at Thornbury this morning. 10 kt SE , 10 degrees , 0.6 mm from the weak front overnight, lit the fire , making mince pies and opening pressies . Merry Xmas everyone

In relation to Mark Thomas posting last night re Le Bons Bay weather . This info from NRFA webesite Fire weather reports for today show this rainfall for the 24 hours ended at 1300 today so met service may have been right
Le Bons Bay 111.6 mm

What?!?!? How is that possible. Here in Christchurch we got nothing when the wind was NE from the outskirt of that sub tropical low, yet your saying Le Bons Bay got 111.6mm with 27.6mm falling in one hour?! I'm sorry, i find the rainfall amazing for the area that it is in itself, but considering there was nothing at all even on the radar there is no way that 111.6mm could have been recorded there.

tich wrote:

Think the Metservice have made a big mistake with the issue of the wettest place in last hour being Le Bons Bay with 27.2mm in the last hour! hahaha no way! There isnt even anything near there on the radar. Wonder how they managed to do that

Probably a typo - they probably meant 2.7mm. Even that seems like too much - cloudy this morning out on Banks peninsula, but drizzle only just begun where I am. (west side of Akaroa Harbour)

This surely backs that up considering the location of Tich. Thats so weird!

Hi Mark

If you look at Met Service Rural and go to the 24 hour rainfall map you will see a high rainfall spot on the southern part of BP. I note the time series satellite pics showed cloud over BP Xmas Eve and yesterday . Is it possible that Christchurch radar could miss rain beraing cloud from the shadow effect of the Port Hills ?

Having been not too far from LeBons Bay, I'm sure I would've noticed any sign of heavy rain over there, even if it was localised. Xmas Eve was dry and the clouds didn't look black yesterday. On the western side of Akaroa harbour we only got light drizzly rain, probably only a few mm. (and it started only after LeBons showed those high figures)

Is it possible the raingauge that Met Service and the National Rural Fire Authority use are one and the same thus we have a faulty gauge for both authorities ?