Gloomy June

[Razor]

I think this deserves its own thread... 18 days now and only 13 hours and 48 mins of sun here in Christchurch. Lucky its so warm huh

https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zeal ... -ever.html

[03Stormchaser]

Worse June i can remember, on the other hand we have had like one frost?

[Captain Salty]

how does our mean temp compare so far to an average june? overnight temps have been staying higher than predicted.

[RWood]

I'll warrant a few other places in the eastern zones have pretty abysmal totals MTD as well. Crazy weather.

However Invercargill's 35 hours in June 1935 should be safe.

[Razor]

Mean Chch temp 2 degrees higher than average. 1 frost here so far this year (Halswell). Cooler nights ahead from later this week.

We are also closing in on the total average rainfall for the whole year.

[NZ Thunderstorm Soc]

Been bloody gloomy down here all right on the odd day.

[tgsnoopy]

Wow, would suck to have solar powered equipment down there, I'd be dead by now.

[JP.]

I can never remember such a long period of overcast gloomy weather. The record in 1981 was 59 hours of sunlight from memory so we have a good chance of beating that. I see over the weekend and late next week looks quite sunny so it could be close.

As others have said the higher temps have offset the sunshine, its weird waking up to 6-8c overnight temps in June!

[Razor]

It teased earlier with 20 mins of sun. Drizzly showers since. Might see a few sunshine hours today though. So we need to average 4 hours or so per day of sun the rest of the month to avoid a record. 10 day forecast suggests that is touch and go with some level of cloudyness in the mix most days.

[TonyT]

It teased earlier with 20 mins of sun. Drizzly showers since. Might see a few sunshine hours today though. So we need to average 4 hours or so per day of sun the rest of the month to avoid a record. 10 day forecast suggests that is touch and go with some level of cloudyness in the mix most days.

Easy. it won't be a record month.

[Razor]

It teased earlier with 20 mins of sun. Drizzly showers since. Might see a few sunshine hours today though. So we need to average 4 hours or so per day of sun the rest of the month to avoid a record. 10 day forecast suggests that is touch and go with some level of cloudyness in the mix most days.

Easy. it won't be a record month.

I'm not so confident on that front. But it'll be better rest of month than it has been, for sure. Maybe 2 hours sun here today in the gaps in the stratocumulus

[RWood]

Wellington only a little better - 27.2 hours in 17 days, and yesterday will be a nil tally. Should avoid a record low however.

[spwill]

Should get a full day of sun on Friday in Chch and mainly sunny for Wellington, Saturday looks okay as well.

[NZ Thunderstorm Soc]

Hopefully down here as well although it was nice and sunny here around lunchtime, today.

[NZstorm]

Auckland gets a lot of low cloud in October/November with the anticyclonic southwester. With El Nino developing this year it could be worse than usual.

[Razor]

Its been a mixed bag here today I'm guessing maybe 3-4 hours sunshine in the CBD, but I may be giving it a generous slant

So at best we're about 20 hours from 20 days. Roughly assessing about 80-90 hours approx of flat out maximum solar possible in 10 days accumulation at this time of year if it was totally clear every day, so we need about a 50% outcome from that to head off the local 'record' of 58 hours.

Watching the skies with interest

[RWood]

We may get boosted to about 32-33 today after 20 days. Re Ch'ch lows, using the only available horizon data shows that March 1979 (80 hours) was relatively duller than either June 1981 (59) or July 1977 (61).


During some of the dullest days I tried to imagine what it would be like getting this much sun in a non-summer month … a calendar from Calama, Chile (where I once spent a few days)…


http://api.wxug.com/history/airport/SCC ... .wmo=85432

The rainfall claimed on one of the days is wrong - Meteo Chile shows nil rainfall YTD in the hyperdesert towns of Arica, Iquique, Antofagasta and Calama.

[RWood]

Auckland gets a lot of low cloud in October/November with the anticyclonic southwester. With El Nino developing this year it could be worse than usual.

The EWSs at Albany and Motat show around 240 hours last November, so there couldn't have been all that much cloudiness.

[NZ Thunderstorm Soc]

Interesting front page headlines in this morning's Timaru Herald about "No sun = no frost= no smog".
Timaru usually has a high pollution rate but so far no day have exceeded the guidelines for high pollution despite "smoke police" going out and checking the chimneys for 'exceeding 15 minutes after light up'
No mention of sunshine hours but they could be down like Christchurch.

[Simon Culling]

MetService has provided sunshine totals for 8 NZ stations up to the 18th of June, with Christchurch + Wellington standing out as particularly cloudy so far this month. Looks like a typical winter's month for us in the UK.

https://twitter.com/MetService/status/1 ... 2515845122

[NZstorm]

Auckland gets a lot of low cloud in October/November with the anticyclonic southwester. With El Nino developing this year it could be worse than usual.

The EWSs at Albany and Motat show around 240 hours last November, so there couldn't have been all that much cloudiness.

Last November was great but October lousy.

Where is the climate station at Motat? Is it Motat Great North Road or Motat at Meola Road? Just curious as I live nearby.

[Razor]

Interesting front page headlines in this morning's Timaru Herald about "No sun = no frost= no smog".
Timaru usually has a high pollution rate but so far no day have exceeded the guidelines for high pollution despite "smoke police" going out and checking the chimneys for 'exceeding 15 minutes after light up'
No mention of sunshine hours but they could be down like Christchurch.

Not cold enough. Timaru requires the cold inversion layer for smog to get trapped , same as here in Chch. It'll come soon enough

[Nev]

Where is the climate station at Motat? Is it Motat Great North Road or Motat at Meola Road? Just curious as I live nearby.

The EWS is in Motat's Meloa Rd aviation complex according to NIWA's coordinates (records began in Feb 2016).

[RWood]

MetService has provided sunshine totals for 8 NZ stations up to the 18th of June, with Christchurch + Wellington standing out as particularly cloudy so far this month. Looks like a typical winter's month for us in the UK.

https://twitter.com/MetService/status/1 ... 2515845122

Wellington's sun for the 6 weeks commencing 10 May will be close to an all-time low - certainly one of the most miserable spells I have experienced. However much worse was a 30-day spell in Invercargill during my schooldays, spanning part of a May & June, with just 35 hours in total.

But as I have mentioned in older posts, the best ever percentages of recordable sun in NZ occurred in a winter month - July 1952 - and the worst ever in a summer month - December 1959.

[BeaconHill]

Wellington sure has been decidedly dull the last 6+ weeks. I started cycling to work on a daily basis at the start of 2017, and last June/July there were only a handful of evenings that meant it was getting dark soon after 5pm. This year it has been the norm that it has been getting very dark at that time.

It has all been made worse by the fact there have been so many days with some amount of rain (26 out of 32 days with some rainfall measured).

Screen Shot 2018-06-21 at 8.50.06 AM.png

But..... at least the sun is now setting later again!! (4:58pm vs 4:57pm)