General July Weather

[Richard]

Some of you have been talking about how mild its been so far this winter in your neck of the woods,even where i am its been warmer than average,not so much daytime temps but night time frosts have not been as heavy as what would be expected at this time of year.
Hopefully we aren't to far away now from seeing the start of the NW season,speaking of which,looks to be a few milder NW days mid next week

[Michael]

we must of had our windiest weather of the year the last 24 hours,some of the needles instead of having the daddylonglegs shape quite a few are the 6 oclock look.

[RWood]

Some of you have been talking about how mild its been so far this winter in your neck of the woods,even where i am its been warmer than average,not so much daytime temps but night time frosts have not been as heavy as what would be expected at this time of year.
Hopefully we aren't to far away now from seeing the start of the NW season,speaking of which,looks to be a few milder NW days mid next week

I think in Wellington, Marlborough and Nelson cooler and much drier weather would have been preferred to the wet, cloudy conditions from mid-May to the end of June - hopefully at the end of the current lot there might be some change of regime.

[spwill]

I think in Wellington, Marlborough and Nelson cooler and much drier weather would have been preferred to the wet

When cold combines with wet it can very miserable. I think the wet easterly flow on the East coast is by far the worst weather form in NZ.
I see Niwa are going for stronger than average westerlies for the SI ( july, September ), higher sea level preasure over the NI and drier.

[RWood]

I think in Wellington, Marlborough and Nelson cooler and much drier weather would have been preferred to the wet

When cold combines with wet it can very miserable. I think the wet easterly flow on the East coast is by far the worst weather form in NZ.
I see Niwa are going for stronger than average westerlies for the SI ( july, September ), higher sea level preasure over the NI and drier.

Some of the prolonged cloudy, showery and cold SW/W stuff that hit Southland in the autumn and winter of 1972 (as an example) is probably worse if you allow for duration.

So far the NIWA pick has been well off for rainfall (May-July - still the E-W balance is all wrong). But maybe a change will occur soon. The 1988/89 La Nina had a phase of dominant westerlies and an exceptionally NW-dominated month (Aug-Oct 1988) - but that was a very strong La Nina.

[Richard]

Some of you have been talking about how mild its been so far this winter in your neck of the woods,even where i am its been warmer than average,not so much daytime temps but night time frosts have not been as heavy as what would be expected at this time of year.
Hopefully we aren't to far away now from seeing the start of the NW season,speaking of which,looks to be a few milder NW days mid next week

I think in Wellington, Marlborough and Nelson cooler and much drier weather would have been preferred to the wet, cloudy conditions from mid-May to the end of June - hopefully at the end of the current lot there might be some change of regime.

This area missed a lot of that wet weather that affected most of northern and eastern South Island places,though we still had enough to give the country side a good soaking we haven't ended up as wet as in previous winters.

[rawdon]

Hi Steve here from Upper Hutt ..Todays temp has not gone above 8C. Another day of gloom, wet, and wind. The good news is that a strong high is heading our way for the weekend. But with that comes frost and frozen toes in bed at night.!!

Steve

[Tim S]

I think in Wellington, Marlborough and Nelson cooler and much drier weather would have been preferred to the wet

When cold combines with wet it can very miserable. I think the wet easterly flow on the East coast is by far the worst weather form in NZ.
I see Niwa are going for stronger than average westerlies for the SI ( july, September ), higher sea level preasure over the NI and drier.

I prefer cold and wet to cold and dry but thats probably because that is still a novelty to me. Fine frosty days are great too but the novelty of those are already starting to wear off, we've had around 10 ground frosts in a row here and its getting a tad repetitive, I am feeling like I am back in Perth with all this repetition! (although I know those further south will be thinking I am soft!) though I am not complaining as the days have been awesome and since we haven't had a drop of rain for those 10 days the ground is starting to dry out a bit but everything is still nice and green, except when you go out of Richmond a bit towards Nelson Lakes as there has been some good frosts out that way of late and looks fairly wintery out that way.

Although I am not too happy that Rainbow ski field only has enough snow for the learners slope, although its hardly surprising given how many rain events from Tasman lows we had in May and June

And Rwood I'm not sure drier weather would have been preferred in Marlborough and Nelson due to the huge rainfall deficit areas in these regions heading into the start of May, surely the extra soil moisture will be welcome once things start to warm up again in a few months time?

[Storm Struck]

Some slight deep convection in the shower clouds wafting through before, noticed quite well as i was driving home from sunshine inland although did have the odd shower at work.
Then some brief heavy showers laced with tiny hail here, so theres some omph in those showers.
I would expect the snow level will go much lower than 600m overnight in Canterbury, maybe down to 200m with light flurries there although could be the odd heavier snow shower in deeper shower cloud like todays.
Sleet and hail or snail to sea level.
If next weeks milder NW days will be anything to go by we could be looking at another wintry blast by this time next week but thats next week .

[Michael]

I dont know if I'd prefer that having been born here,never lived anywhere out of the country let alone even the south island apart from holidays in either who knows if I had it be different.may explain my bias.

I prefer cold and wet to cold and dry but thats probably because that is still a novelty to me.

[Lukemyster]

Interesting to see that 3news has replaced the todays maximum temperature at the bottom of the screen during the weather with a today maximum low for winter. Kinda strange considering Alexandra will win it 75% of the time.

[RWood]

[quote="Tim S]
And Rwood I'm not sure drier weather would have been preferred in Marlborough and Nelson due to the huge rainfall deficit areas in these regions heading into the start of May, surely the extra soil moisture will be welcome once things start to warm up again in a few months time?[/quote]

They were complaining about too much rain in Blenheim, though the above is a good point.

[CHCH Weather Chaser]

Some rather beafy showers this evening falling. Clearing skies between showers where you can see stars before the showers are right back again. This is typical of chain showers for CHCH, although i was anticipating dirzzly rain it has been somewhat different to that. 5mm to date.

[Talbotm]

I have to say this weather pattern with constant tropical lows hounding us all the time is starting to annoy me. I just want some good old deep southerlys from off the Antartic shelf this same old rubbish weather been happening for a month or two now. One good thing about it and the only good thing about this weather is the Curlers got do have there competiton on the frozen idaburn dam. But come on Huey give us some meaty southerlies.

[post edited by moderator to conform with forum rules]

[Dale]

Noticed a few coldies off towards the airport late arvo.. very shallow but capping around 200-350, with those upper temps, enough to drop some hail.
Going to be some cold mornings here in the Auckland region......

[tich]

It was wet out near Akaroa from about 10am this morning until early afternoon, with showers continuing until I went back to Chch mid/late afternoon. Cold southerly became strong and gusty in afternoon, but lighter in Chch. No snow visible on BP hills today; that will probably change tonight. (MetService said 700m in Canterbury, I guess it's down to about 500m by now)

[NZstorm]

Certainly a very cold airmass over the South Island today. But there is no upper level support for snow to very low levels, pretty much as the gfs has been modeling.

[Razor]

Doesn't seem especially cold here actually, for mid winter. Occasional rain showers coming though, temps haven't been below 5 degrees here- which is not what I'd call a classic bonechiller at all.

Webcam at Tekapo shows nothing exciting there- looks to be clear

[spwill]

Plenty of shower cloud in that southerly flow but not looking very deep http://www.weatherzone.com.au/satellite ... ye=1&lyf=1

Have a look at the sat pic for Western Australia, a good example of deep shower clouds currently
http://www.weatherzone.com.au/satellite ... nc=3&lyf=1

[Richard]

looking at the snow line on the hills nearby the snow level is about 500m.
Only had 1mm from this southerly so far with the odd light shower

[TonyT]

Just had our heaviest shower of the morning (not that heavy really) and it was certainly sleety, temp dropped to 3deg and there were some melting snow flakes mixed in. Had a report of a light snow shower on Mt Grey at about the 200m mark earlier this morning, but brief and nothing settling.

[Storm Struck]

Showers continuing here with some sleet this morning even in Kaiapoi, much the same up at work sleet and grapel which is interesting being at just over 200m up there.
Maybe some more icy type showers tonight as these showers wont clear until late tomorrow morning.
8mm in the gauge since 7am yesterday.

[Razor]

Another one of those showers just fired through town- appeared to possible have some sleet in it, was breifly quite a heavy downpour

[03Stormchaser]

A short lived but heavy shower mixed with sleet in Merivale about 2pm this afternoon from a coldie passing through.

[melja]

So Tony was spot on with his forcast then