NZ Weather Forum

I am thinking January will be a dry month. I am thinking it will get quite hot around new zealand too.

tornado wrote: ↑Thu 26/12/2019 12:08 I am thinking January will be a dry month. I am thinking it will get quite hot around new zealand too.

Looks like a mixed bag for the first 10 days of January.
Central Otago could catch some heavy rain later tomorrow to continue the unusual wet theme there.
Some windy SW flow for Auckland during the period, hopefully plenty of sunshine though.

edit for typo

tornado wrote: ↑Thu 26/12/2019 12:08 I am thinking January will be a dry month. I am thinking it will get quite hot around new zealand too.

First week temperatures look near average for NZ , some warm days but cool days also.

I'll make a bold call - 1st January will be the hottest day of 2020 for some locations.

Lets try a little crystal ball gazing. ECMWF is projecting a strong MJO phase 4 and 5 to develop in the second week of January. For us that usually means an approaching anticyclone with some southerly quarter flow; then the anticyclone passing over, then milder northerly quarter flow as it moves away. Given the forecast strength of this MJO pulse, then if this verifies the trend should be pretty clear over NZ.

Phase 4/5 favours TC development northwest of Australia, and phase 5/6 favours development in the Coral Sea, so keep an eye out for another TC to form there around 3rd week of January if the MJO continues from 4/5 to 5/6. If that happens (lots of "ifs"!) then tropical storm(s) could affect NZ last week of the month.

Happy New Year to all.

Opened the curtains ten minutes ago and was surprised to see the sun, well above the horizon, showing only faintly and pink-red, since obscured by cloud/haze: quite a striking sight.

20°C at present and feels quite still and airless.

Both UKmet and ECMWF showing some heavy convective precip over inland Southland and Otago this afternoon. Not exactly a lot of CAPE there but Isolated thunderstorms possible too.

Hard to see 34 degrees at this stage. Lots of cloud cover this morning so got a long way to go.

Cantab03 wrote: ↑Wed 01/01/2020 08:21 Hard to see 34 degrees at this stage. Lots of cloud cover this morning so got a long way to go.

That's not cloud, could safely say that this smoke 'may not' allow it to warm to 34

Sun higher in the overcast sky now and faintly glowing orange, like a street-light seen through fog.

32 yesterday, very hazy this morning with rain after lunch by the looks..16 deg atm

I have seen photos of where its real thick ozzy smoke in the southland this morning!
like still dark light at 9am!

^Dunedin!
https://twitter.com/BeneHoltmann/status ... 36/photo/1

The Himawari visible Sat image, wow.........

Glentanner webcam images look extraordinary today:

https://www.glentanner.co.nz/web-cam/

Orion wrote: ↑Wed 01/01/2020 14:30 Glentanner webcam images look extraordinary today:

https://www.glentanner.co.nz/web-cam/

The temp at nearby Mt Cook Airport is 24C with dp -2C, so its certainly just the haze obscuring the visibility.

Queenstown and Wanaka airports have thunder on their most recent ob. Manapouri a bit earlier.

Conformed by my Queenstown contact, they had some 'really good' T&L, so I'm told.

i see metservice forecast for oamaru says"overcast with light rain" Meanwhile on the rain radar theres a decent rain band going over and it looks more than light rain. strange.

tornado wrote: ↑Wed 01/01/2020 19:28 i see metservice forecast for oamaru says"overcast with light rain" Meanwhile on the rain radar theres a decent rain band going over and it looks more than light rain. strange.

Inversion layers probably playing havoc with the radar beam.

tornado wrote: ↑Wed 01/01/2020 19:28 i see metservice forecast for oamaru says"overcast with light rain" Meanwhile on the rain radar theres a decent rain band going over and it looks more than light rain. strange.

They're had a little more than 'light' rain for sure.

Owing to the lack of sunshine, it was a rather cool day, especially this evening where we had to have the heat pump going.
Interesting to see the MS had the word smoke in their forecasts for today.

Today it only got up to 19.4C, not the high temperatures that MS did forecast although it was a bit warmer further north from here.
Coming onto rain this evening with 0.3mm recorded for today, the heaviest rain we have had so far this year
I did notice that it was quite wet around the Oamaru area today but most of it went out to sea.
Orange/grey sky cloud cover (As) did look more or a greyer look this evening.

Medium range model output suggests a continuation of this spring like SW pattern into mid January. Temperatures could easily end up below average this month.

More elevated thunder over the western ranges of Otago early this morning, not much rainfall though.

yes , amazing how more SW in the forecast (it has happened before where Auckland has had cool SW winds for all of January if my memory serves me correctly (e.g very early 90's)

As far as the models are concerned the MJO 4/5 is in the driving seat for the next couple of weeks. It remains to be seen if that turns out to be the case.