Unstable Southern Tasman Low, 12th to 16th May

[Orion]

A layer of white soggy-looking cloud rushing in from the east, while above that, other cloud crosses from the west.
Suddenly a fresh easterly breeze picking up...
Lightning-static not so frequent now.
Temp. 8.5 degrees.

[snowstormwatcher]

Just drove though some heavy rain and hail south of Fairlie, Dry here but looks very dark to the south.

[NZstorm]

I like the hail photo.

Not much happening here today. CB photo taken about 2pm.

[mikestormchaser]

im heading inland now for a chase, big lightning strike out that way then

[Lacertae]

A shame I got stuck in the traffic when getting out of work, by the time I reached the Sign of the Kiwi most of the light was gone ... oh well, not too bad a surprise for a Tuesday !

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[TonyT]

Some rumbles and flashes for the last 15 mins to the north of here, makes for good viewing at this time of the evening.

[Storm Struck]

It seems the two storm cell areas when they joined up it got quite lightning active, but not for too long as it has since died off lightning wise.
Havnt seen any myself but ive had brief big drops of rain before and scattered TCU, wind is slowly going southerly here.
No point heading off inland from here as i would be driving blind into the storm with all that moderate rain ahead of the main core, best view point is on the outside of the storm here in kaiapoi but it hasnt fired lightning since.
Interesting how these cells are coming up and hugging the foothills and staying away from central to coastal canterbury, still deep stuff on the radars though .

[Razor]

Lostsa purple on the radars. Somewhere copped it...

[CHCH Weather Chaser]

Just went for a wee drive, saw a few lightning strikes!

Looking at radar - seems most the activity has passed by to our west and now North Canterbury in the firing line. Maybe something for us a little later with a more coastal looking cell around Timaru

[Storm Struck]

A few low ground rumbling booms heard not long ago, so went outside and theres some bright flashes to the NE of here up Waikari way i would say even seen a bolt come down in the cloud .
Raining here now just lightly though.

[KiwiWeather]

Some great action here and about time

[03Stormchaser]

Chased today, didnt have my tripod which wasnt helpful and my video camera was almost flat good chase tho, a number of close cgs witnessed, impressive cloud structure, hail and heavy rain. Aaron was also out and managed a few good lightning strikes.

[CHCH Weather Chaser]

First heavy shower here now, prob double the monthly rainfall to date in the space of minutes!

[jamie]

Had a rough flight from Hamilton to Auckland. Little plane flying thru a cell was neat fun haha. Flight to palmy was great too. We had to a detour and had to fly around a good looking cell. It had fantastic mamma on it. I didn't have a camera to take a photo tho. But it looked more like photos of mama we see coming from USA.

[mikestormchaser]

Awsome photos there lacertae! i took off chasing abit late! if i had of gone abit sooner i would of copped a good storm but instead, as i got out to kirwee it had to die didnt it. 'sigh' not surprisingly though! it always had that chance once the sun was gone and heating wasnt there to keep it going..
We really needed these oppotunitys and the timing to come through as it did today in the middle of dam summer!!! not now when we are now starting to get into snow season. not storm season! dammit grrr

[Aucklandstorm]

Some big thunder / lightning going off right now around mt roskil area Auckland.

[littleheaven]

Just heard thunder again in Glenfield, North Shore. Lightning too, appears to be coming from the south west.

[Thunder]

Had a good chase and got a few lightning photo's from the Waimak Gorge, was as I often say "Awesome!"

[spwill]

Well done Aaron.

Some thunder here around 5am with this next line crossing, distant thunder but a lovely sound to wake up to

lightning map

[GraemeWi]

We had a good cell come through here in Henderson, thunder was consistent every 30 seconds for a while.

[NZstorm]

Observed lightning thunder this morning too.

Last nights sounding from NZWP was the classic coldie thunderstorm sounding. 500mb -25C, CAPE 275j/kg.
60kt upper flow there too

[Manukau heads obs]

the cell over the kaipara is going off at the moment, even putting static on our tv!

[NZstorm]

Good chasing there Aaron. Nice photo.

[CHCH Weather Chaser]

5.5mm overnight from on/off showers. Chain showers have moved out over BP now. Monthly rainfall to 7.5mm

[David]

Apparently there was some thunder round here last night too, though I slept through it Based on how wet it was between 5am and 6am, maybe it was in that time period?