Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by Orion »

SnwAddct - good wintry photos, especially of Ohakune _b
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by shovelopikis »

8c and snowing right now with Sun!! Thats a first...was not expecting snow showers today.
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by Razor »

NZ Herald reports via Civil Defence that it has snowed on Great Barrier Island. Presumably on Mt Hobson/ Mt Heale? They'd be high enough, about 600m off the top of my head
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by tich »

Razor wrote:NZ Herald reports via Civil Defence that it has snowed on Great Barrier Island. Presumably on Mt Hobson/ Mt Heale? They'd be high enough, about 600m off the top of my head
The photo shown on the Auckland Civil Defence Facebook page is of a white coating at Claris, near sea-level on the east side of the island. Surely must be hail.
Mt Hobson is 621m. I was told when on the island that there were non-settling snowflakes reported on a high property on the island during the August 2011 wintry outbreak.
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by spwill »

tich wrote: The photo shown on the Auckland Civil Defence Facebook page is of a white coating at Claris, near sea-level on the east side of the island. Surely must be hail.
.
Yes, hail there, came with the thunderstorms in that area yesterday evening
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by littleheaven »

Civil Defence saying on Twitter that flurries were observed, and that MetService are saying it was probably graupel. But that photo posted does look more like a result of the hailstorm.
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by spwill »

An active area of Cbs onto the eastern NI this evening :smile:
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by Wildland »

Some photos of today's snow at Tawa and notes on other recent falls can be found here.

http://wildland.owdjim.gen.nz/?p=1561
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by dizzy »

littleheaven wrote:Civil Defence saying on Twitter that flurries were observed, and that MetService are saying it was probably graupel. But that photo posted does look more like a result of the hailstorm.
99% of NZ's hail is actually graupel. I think Canterbury sometimes gets some decent hailstorms in the summer, but other than that we usually just get teeny tiny hailstones, i.e. graupel. If it were true hail it would be big enough that it would surely be impossible to confuse for snow. In saying that though, I guess Aucklander's don't necessarily know what snow looks like...
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by tgsnoopy »

dizzy wrote:99% of NZ's hail is actually graupel
This wasn't Graupel ;)
http://www.weatherforum.org.nz/phpBB3/v ... 962#p66962
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by spwill »

dizzy wrote:
littleheaven wrote:Civil Defence saying on Twitter that flurries were observed, and that MetService are saying it was probably graupel. But that photo posted does look more like a result of the hailstorm.
99% of NZ's hail is actually graupel. I think Canterbury sometimes gets some decent hailstorms in the summer, but other than that we usually just get teeny tiny hailstones, i.e. graupel. If it were true hail it would be big enough that it would surely be impossible to confuse for snow. In saying that though, I guess Aucklander's don't necessarily know what snow looks like...
It seems there are some people who don't know what hail looks like
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by Razor »

tgsnoopy wrote:
dizzy wrote:99% of NZ's hail is actually graupel
This wasn't Graupel ;)
http://www.weatherforum.org.nz/phpBB3/v ... 962#p66962
I take Dizzy's point, noting the pics attached above were probably in the 'less common' category from a summer storm'

Certainly most of the winter hail we get in NZ would tend to be 'graupel', right?
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by NZstorm »

Most hail in NZ is proper hail (solid ice).

Graupel is a ball of snow (snow pellets). Common in coastal Otago/Southland in winter. We had graupel in Auckland about 5 years ago.
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by Razor »

NZstorm wrote:Most hail in NZ is proper hail (solid ice).

Graupel is a ball of snow (snow pellets). Common in coastal Otago/Southland in winter. We had graupel in Auckland about 5 years ago.
Its also common here in Canterbury
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by spwill »

Razor wrote: I take Dizzy's point, noting the pics attached above were probably in the 'less common' category from a summer storm'
Certainly most of the winter hail we get in NZ would tend to be 'graupel', right?
Possibly the case for Dunedin - Christchurch.

I'm picking Invercargill would see more hail than graupel, they catch the tall Cb clouds in the cold unstable westerlies which would tend to have hail.
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by dizzy »

NZstorm wrote:Most hail in NZ is proper hail (solid ice).

Graupel is a ball of snow (snow pellets). Common in coastal Otago/Southland in winter. We had graupel in Auckland about 5 years ago.
We've clearly been taught different definitions of hail vs. graupel. I was taught that graupel is a result of rimed ice, whereas hail consists of snap-frozen, clear ice, and often has layers, as it is cycled through a CB multiple times in the updraughts.
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by SnwAddct »

Amazing to see that days later there is still snow on the Desert Rd, goes to show how long its been cold for..
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by shovelopikis »

SnwAddct wrote:Amazing to see that days later there is still snow on the Desert Rd, goes to show how long its been cold for..
Not that odd...wasn't last year like 1m deep in parts and lasted weeks?
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Re: Low/Heavy Snow - Central and Lower North Island - July 7-10

Unread post by NZstorm »

I drove down the Desert Road Sunday.

I think the lingering cold air has made the lower level snow hang on longer than normal.
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