B1.2.5 New Zealand: Climate: Is it wet in New Zealand?
Description
This article is from the New Zealand FAQ, by Phil Stuart-Jones and Lin Nah with numerous contributions by others.
B1.2.5 New Zealand: Climate: Is it wet in New Zealand?
Charles Eggen gives us:
"The greatest amount I have heard of was at the hut on Whitcombe river at
Frew creek which is just south of the Hokitika river in Westland. That was
1967 and amounted to 10670 mm or about 420 inches.
From 14/3/67 to 13/3/68 the 10670 mm that fell is the highest in NZ for a
12 month period. Over an exact calendar year the highest is 10210 mm (same
place) within NZ and 22990 mm for the World (Cherrapunji, India in 1861)."
The highest rainfall in NZ for a 24 hour period was 582 mm on 7/9/1969 at
Rapid Creek, Hokitika although this record may have been broken on 22
January 1994; a similar locality and ~647mm of rain.
From: blair@mullara.met.unimelb.EDU.AU (Blair Trewin)
Date: 12 Sep 1997 01:16:03 GMT
>: Is it wet in New Zealand? Charles Eggen gives us:
>: <rest of comments from Charles snipped>
I seem to recall reading somewhere about an experimental site in this
region having a mean annual rainfall up around 11000-12000mm, although
this may have been an estimate based on a few months' data. Given that
there are few gauges in the area where I would expect the highest
precipitation, around 800-1200 metres elevation, it would not surprise
me if there are pockets of 10000+ mm mean annual rainfall (which
implies a highest total in the vicinity of 15000) in uninstrumented
areas.
In marked contrast, central Otago is very dry in places - Alexandra
has about 350mm per year, and I'd expect that there would be local
pockets below 300. Air of maritime origins loses much of its
moisture as it rises over mountains (the prevailing airstreams in
NZ are from the west, which explains why the western slopes of
the Southern Alps and Fiordland are so wet) and the lee slopes
are in 'rainshadow': central Otago is largely sheltered from
all directions.
>: The highest rainfall in NZ for a 24 hour period was 582 mm on 7/9/1969 at
>: Rapid Creek, Hokitika although this record may have been broken on 22
>: January 1994; a similar locality and ~647mm of rain.
It was. I was attempting to visit the West Coast on this day -
meteorologically interesting but touristically miserable. I'm still
waiting to see the glaciers :-(
Ross Levis kindly offered:
All the weather links you should ever need are located on my ISP page at:
http://www.enternet.co.nz/weather.html
which links to VUW and shows some other Antarctic pictures.
Frank van der Hulst and Tony Wilkes provided (combined and mildly amended):
NZ Metservice forecasts, including TV-style maps showing forecasts:
http://web.co.nz/weather/
Satellite weather pictures from VUW:
http://www.rses.vuw.ac.nz/meteorology/pictures/
[ see also ...meteorology/maps.html and ...pictures/ir1/latest.jpg ]
These are in mono. For similar maps in colour:
http://rs560.cl.msu.edu/weather/
Weather of the whole region, including NZ. Up to 3-day forecasts,
including satellite pictures and maps showing isobars & sea surface winds
over the Tasman & NZ:
gopher://gilgamesh.ho.BoM.GOV.AU/1/1/Australian%20Weather%20Information
gopher://gilgamesh.ho.BoM.GOV:70/11/Australian%20Weather%Information/Weatrts
[ not sure if the second one is correct ]
Latest (3-hourly) weather satellite images:
http://geog.canterbury.ac.nz/weather/index.html
The NZ sites seem to be somewhat intermittent, and often their latest
images are 3 or 4 days old. The Aussie site is probably the most useful.
Airways Corp also has a Web site http://www.airways.co.nz/index.html which
contains articles from their latest magazine.
Snspot details and solar activity, of interest to radio hams, at:
http://www.sel.bldroc.gov/today.html
Hugh Grierson suggests to point your browser at
gopher://gilgamesh.ho.bom.gov.au:70/
and follow the links "Australian weather information ..." -> "Weather
Charts".
Other links
http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~stormy
http://www.xtra.co.nz/metservice/index.shtml
but the latter requires a Java capable reader.
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