Low pressure for the north - Mar 19-22

[NZstorm]

Looking like a low pressure system developing to the north of the country today drifts south and hangs around northern NZ for a few days.
Looks like rain, possibly heavy, overnight tonight and tomorrow for northern areas.

[David]

Metservice 3 day rain model sure suggests some heavy falls - here is the forecast image for 7am tomorrow:

[David]

Metservice warning of 180-200mm possible for east coast areas of Northland!

[CHCH Weather Chaser]

The subtropical low is now becoming established over the North of Northland looking at the radar. Next 12-18 hours should be interesting.

[Nev]

I see Kerikeri-Weather is over 120mm since yesterday (incl. about 8mm early yesterday morn).

18mm here so far since just after midnight.

[spwill]

Some very heavy rain over parts of Northland currently.

Light rain and light winds here, a cool 16C, dewpoint 16C.

[David]

My station only reads 13mm but since around Dec it always reads lower than surrounding weather stations, not sure why but have put my manual gauge out this morning to compare. Would be good to get a high-ish total for comparison

[Manukau heads obs]

the tasman sea is a lake this morning , reports of it being the flatest people have seen it, barely a ripple
http://www.surf2surf.com/reports/north-piha

[Nev]

Reports of downed trees causing minor power outages in Northland and roads in Kaeo underwater. 1000 hPa at Cape Reinga.

21mm here to 9am

Latest sat-pic c/o NOAA

[Brassnz]

14mm at our place, to 7.30am this morning.

[Manukau heads obs]

got to wonder about the media sometimes:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/6596862 ... her-change

not sure what a late in the day southerly change in wellington (last line of the article) has anything to do with the rest of the article (which is not related to a southerly change at all)

[jamie]

yes i agree Brian. Doesnt fit at all. Also why is the title of the Article "Southerly blast brings flooding"? its not from the south at all. Its a subtropical low!!!!

[NZstorm]

A cool SE flow here though. Unfortunately a cool SE is undercutting the warmer airmass. Persistent light rain here.

Possibly another burst of significant rainfall for the north on Wednesday with a small low dropping down from the tropics. Have to see if that verifies.

[Nev]

Lost power here for nearly 3 hours from 10:30am - trees versus nearby power-lines.

Rain eased temporarily around midday - 29mm in 12 hours.

Sure is gusty though - Tiritiri currently up around 74 km/h, but I think it may have been higher earlier.

[Michael]

Quite strange theres little if any movement of the clouds above,is it the upper low over us?

[spwill]

Quite strange theres little if any movement of the clouds above,?

Our cloud cover is currently quite high with the flow being SE.

Feature of the day here is the coolness, temp stuck on 16C.

[David]

My station only reads 13mm but since around Dec it always reads lower than surrounding weather stations, not sure why but have put my manual gauge out this morning to compare. Would be good to get a high-ish total for comparison

Well that was a bummer, weather station reported an extra 9.6mm through the day and the manual gauge picked up 13.2mm. Not sure what's gone wrong!

[Nev]

got to wonder about the media sometimes:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/6596862 ... her-change

not sure what a late in the day southerly change in wellington (last line of the article) has anything to do with the rest of the article (which is not related to a southerly change at all)

Check out the gallery in their latest update. Also says...

Several planes were unable to land at Auckland Airport this afternoon due to strong cross winds on the runway, an Air New Zealand spokesman said.
...winds had been gusting up to 104kmh at Tiritiri Matangi lighthouse in the Hauraki Gulf, up to 93kmh in Whangaparoa and 55kmh at the airport early this afternoon.

P.S. More pics in the NZ Herald's gallery, plus story.

[Manukau heads obs]

we did get gusts to 37 knots here between 1 and 2pm from the SE
I think the problem for the airport was simply that its a cross wind, as opposed to the actual strength

[Nev]

Yep, agree. 55 km/h (30 kts) isn't that strong for the airport, although perhaps a little more turbulent with height. Strong SE'ers aren't that common for Akld.

Temp hasn't got above 15.5C since 8am here and as low as 14.2C at 2:30pm. Total of 38mm so far.

[Michael]

re airport.It was SE 99% of the time here but we occasionally probably 3-4x it went SSW only 10 seconds or so and howled like hell.maybe that.

[jamie]

I see matangi has had twice as much as me here. 40mm vs 20mm

[NZstorm]

For interest todays midday 200mb wind chart (colours) showing the jet streams. The low sits between two jets streams.

[Tornado Tim]

Yes Jamie, It has pretty much being raining constantly all day here, I would have thought you would have had more.......

Here is my Rainfall Graph over 24 hour (mm) with precip intensity (mm/hr). As you can see it has been fairly light but constant.

[jamie]

Yea Tim it's been constant here since it started during the night. You have just had more intensity. We might get 24 hours of constant rain which we don't get very often.