NZ Weather Forum

NOAA are saying a 75% chance of a La Nina by spring, continuing into summer.

I think this could mean less rainfall for NZ overall this winter/spring, but a wetter than normal summer for the north and east. There are other factors to consider like the MJO and SAM and strength of La Nina, so time will tell.

I think temps will stay above average this year.

Should be in negative values within the next few weeks given how quickly its dropped off over the last month.

NOAA are well behind the play on this. The La Nina is here now, and has been for a few weeks, as predicted. It will be a multi year event, hanging around for a couple of years.

I hope the weather events will be much more interesting than the useless El Niño period we have just come through?

I can't remember the last time there was a La Nina when I was living in Christchurch. I was living in Melbourne for the last one and it was great weather.

Lots of horrible NE winds in a La Nina in chch I thought.

Sent from my Lenovo K50a40 using Tapatalk

La Nina is bad news for ski fields

http://www.weatherzone.com.au/news/snow ... ern/522505
BOM say la nina is better for the OZ ski season.

In the case of NZ subtropical lows can really dump snow on the SI high country.

"So far though, there is little snow on the ground and lifts are not operating yet."
that's from your link from BoM!
Ski management always get all worked up over early falls just to get people in their loop. But NZ is going to have a warmer winter according to NIWA
"In the case of NZ subtropical lows can really dump snow on the SI high country."
-you mean from SE's? Yeah nah - what about NW's before the SE's

Manduke wrote:
-you mean from SE's? Yeah nah - what about NW's before the SE's

With the warm advection snow events the flow will be NE ahead of the approaching Tasman Sea low. The alps block the warmer Tasman Sea airmass at lower levels from crossing the devide.

The warm advective snow event last winter dumped about a metre of snow on the foothills (19th June).
But these set ups are fairly rare.

A couple of notable snow events that have occurred in La Nina years have been the Southland snowstorm, 8th Sep 2010 ( stadium Southland roof collapse) and the Otago snowstorm on the 2nd July 1999, the heaviest on record for parts of Central and West Otago.

spwill wrote:A couple of notable snow events that have occurred in La Nina years have been the Southland snowstorm, 8th Sep 2010 ( stadium Southland roof collapse) and the Otago snowstorm on the 2nd July 1999, the heaviest on record for parts of Central and West Otago.

Yes, good point. Those years saw a lot of precipitation, both here and Australia, but I remember were also cooler. But isn't it a general rule that La Nina years are more often mild and wet? Whatever, it looks like Mt Ruapehu has forgotten how to snow

Things were looking good for Ruapehu but freezing level has just been to high and the rain has eaten away at snow

There are snow possibilities for our ski fields next week.

There is a significant cold system on track for SE Australia later this week.

spwill wrote:There are snow possibilities for our ski fields next week.

There is a significant cold system on track for SE Australia later this week.

Well fingers crossed but no one is in disagreement with NIWA that we are in a warm winter. Coronet has closed. Ruapehu can't open without snow..what they had at the end of May is ALL gone. I think Cadrona is the highest so they may be ok.

There is the pottential for 20 - 40 cm of snow above 1800m this weekend at Ruapehu, which is a good start as all the gullys need to fill in.

I see Perisher and Thredbo ( Australia) have had around 40cm last 24hrs, there will be heavy snow showers there today.

They seem to be in a good patern for snow for the next 2 weeks.

While June can be a good month some years for Australasian ski fields, it is still early season.

SnwAddct wrote:They seem to be in a good patern for snow for the next 2 weeks.

Not too sure about that SnwAddct. I think the La Nina warm winter will stay warm and wet for a while yet and the right amounts of snow could arrive late.

There is also an additional factor called the Southern Annular Modulation as well.