General September Weather

[Orion]

NW wind yesterday blew over part of a garden trellis, quite strong wind at times; I was without internet so didn't report it here then. Sky looked hazy, unsure if that was due to windblown dust from up-country.

A sprinkle of rain here at present; also some interesting cauliflower-cloud forms to the south, probably near the Rangitata River.

[jamie]

Brian and I went out to the manukau heads this afternoon after the local farmers discussion group. There was a gust to 70 knots just before we got there. Was a wild wind.

[Orion]

Oo-er! Thunder!

[Orion]

Four rolls of thunder now in the past few minutes, sounds to be coming from north-east of Ashburton. Nothing particular on rain-radar in that direction...

[tich]

I noticed cumulonimbus way to the south when passing Lake Ellesmere (about 5pm) coming back to Chch from Akaroa this afternoon.

[Orion]

Wind's gone southerly here now. Rain radar looks interesting to the south.

[03Stormchaser]

Rumble of thunder just now

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[Razor]

Sporadic lightning observed over back of Port Hills from Hoon Hay at 8:45pm

[tgsnoopy]

Some media reports about the Ruru (near Cambridge) transmitter tower loosing it's top sections. Multiple Radio stations off the air. Some claiming strong winds and even some claims of a tornado. It was established for TV3 in the late 80's, may even have had Freeview TV transmitters, but haven't observed reports of their loss in reports (only glance read a couple).

[dogmelon]

I've heard a couple of bits of quite distant thunder along with seeing a decent amount of flashes, including one cloud-to-air bolt, from Hornby.

[mikestormchaser]

There has been a few good flashes observed from rolleston tonight to. Clear lightning obsrerved towards birdlings flat.
I did wonder about chances today . Models had been putting out big instability numbers this morning and had me wondering.

[cbm]

Some media reports about the Ruru (near Cambridge) transmitter tower loosing it's top sections. Multiple Radio stations off the air. Some claiming strong winds and even some claims of a tornado. It was established for TV3 in the late 80's, may even have had Freeview TV transmitters, but haven't observed reports of their loss in reports (only glance read a couple).

Noticed at 5:30pm on way home from work radio stations were down so it must have happened before then. In the analogue days tv3 and tv4 came from Ruru. That's why they were always far stronger in Cambridge area than the tvnz channels which came from Te Aroha. Never been any freeview dtv or sky (UHF) signals broadcast from there. All from Te Aroha. Wish there had been as would have made them far easier to receive.

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[NZstorm]

Cold upper air across NZ Saturday thru to Monday with a few thunderstorms/hail around.

Fine day in Auckland but for some lumpy cumulus.

[cbm]

Sure did some damage.



Being on an exposed hillside, should have been desiged for gusts of 150kph or more?

Tends to suggest whatever weather phenomenon hit it was one that concentrated a lot of energy in a small area.

There are houses up there and happened in daylight hours - wonder if anyone saw anything.

[RODALCO]

The rain radar must be out of calibration,
We just had a massive downpour of rain in Albany
radar shows bugged all, has been going for about 30 minutes.

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[Cyclone Tracy]

Yes, certainly some bubbling clouds around Auckland at the moment.

Things are now getting interesting on the weekend. Antarctica is showing signs of the a cold surface temp leak, along with the stratosphere. Eastern Australia is smashing heat records and GFS now showing a 982 hPa cold core deepening gyre around the middle of NZ on the weekend, with a sub tropical jet projected to be blowing at around 300 km/h.

[Cyclone Tracy]

Access R 2809 00z now showing up a 979 hPa cold core cyclonic gyre attacking the North Island with a robust gale to storm force wet westerly on Sunday. Maybe bring the washing in on Saturday night.

[tgsnoopy]

Sure did some damage.



Being on an exposed hillside, should have been desiged for gusts of 150kph or more?

Tends to suggest whatever weather phenomenon hit it was one that concentrated a lot of energy in a small area.

There are houses up there and happened in daylight hours - wonder if anyone saw anything.

Well, it's been a long time since I was up there (TV3 installation project, late 80's). In those days the tower had just been installed and when it was being rigged I recall lots of still wet paint, rushing just days away from the on air date to get everything installed. In fact, when they adjusted the power divider at the top of the mast that split the power to the aerial arrays (at low power) about 5 days out, they never checked the clearances and when the transmitter was finally set to full power there wasn't sufficent and it arced over. Lots of stress and panic ensued. But the turn on date was met. Kiwi's are tenacious hard workers when the S hits the F

I was surprised hat how much more hardware had been added. I sure hope they didn't exceed the wind loading design limits. There were no nearby houses, it's on top of a rural hill.

https://www.google.co.nz/maps/place/37% ... 75.5616844

https://www.google.co.nz/maps/@-37.7894 ... 312!8i6656

[cbm]

Sure did some damage.



Being on an exposed hillside, should have been desiged for gusts of 150kph or more?

Tends to suggest whatever weather phenomenon hit it was one that concentrated a lot of energy in a small area.

There are houses up there and happened in daylight hours - wonder if anyone saw anything.

Well, it's been a long time since I was up there (TV3 installation project, late 80's). In those days the tower had just been installed and when it was being rigged I recall lots of still wet paint, rushing just days away from the on air date to get everything installed. In fact, when they adjusted the power divider at the top of the mast that split the power to the aerial arrays (at low power) about 5 days out, they never checked the clearances and when the transmitter was finally set to full power there wasn't sufficent and it arced over. Lots of stress and panic ensued. But the turn on date was met. Kiwi's are tenacious hard workers when the S hits the F

I was surprised hat how much more hardware had been added. I sure hope they didn't exceed the wind loading design limits. There were no nearby houses, it's on top of a rural hill.

https://www.google.co.nz/maps/place/37% ... 75.5616844

https://www.google.co.nz/maps/@-37.7894 ... 312!8i6656

I've been right to the base of that transmitter more than once, the last time only a couple of years ago. The running club has a race to the top, from the Te Miro Hall on the calendar.

There are no houses on the actual volcanic cone where the transmitter is, true, but there are around 5 properties at the top of Gray road, with 1km-1.5km laterally and a couple of hundred meters elevation of it. Close enough to have noticed something, conceivably.

They did well to get the broadcasting going again by last evening.

[tgsnoopy]

There are no houses on the actual volcanic cone where the transmitter is, true, but there are around 5 properties at the top of Gray road, with 1km-1.5km laterally and a couple of hundred meters elevation of it. Close enough to have noticed something, conceivably.

They did well to get the broadcasting going again by last evening.

Is there still a smaller pole & shed up there? It looks like there is on Google, but that doesn't mean there is.

Have heard that some (all?) of the transmitters have been relocated to Sanitorium Hill.

[cbm]

There are no houses on the actual volcanic cone where the transmitter is, true, but there are around 5 properties at the top of Gray road, with 1km-1.5km laterally and a couple of hundred meters elevation of it. Close enough to have noticed something, conceivably.

They did well to get the broadcasting going again by last evening.

Is there still a smaller pole & shed up there? It looks like there is on Google, but that doesn't mean there is.

Have heard that some (all?) of the transmitters have been relocated to Sanitorium Hill.

Struggling to remember as having just run all the way to the top tended to be trying to get breath back and looking at the view. Remember the shed visible on google, being here, couldn't say what equipment was there in addition to the main tower.

[NZstorm]

The trough moving across Auckland tomorrow morning may support thunder. But chances look better Sunday.

[jamie]

Were some decent showers about yesterday in northern Waikato.

A couple days ago when the forum was down I had heaps of little funnel clouds but couldn't post to say. This week has been unstable for Waikato.

As for the transmitter...brian and I noticed some powerful rising skud and potentially rotations as showers were coming ashore at the manukau heads. We agreed we wouldn't be surprised to hear of a tornado.

The transmitter was out by 4 when I came back over the bombays.

[spwill]

It is looking stormy here Sunday.

Interesting to see SE Queensland is in for some significant rain/showers next week, anyone on holiday there next week picked the wrong week to be there, usually good weather there this time of year.

[NZ Thunderstorm Soc]

Back from Melbourne today.
Weather here just like it was in Melbourne. Pleasant except it was a tad on the cool side on one or 2 days. Shame missed all the thunder/lightning the other day. Really typical, we usually get events like that when I'm away.