Pack the brolly
Summer forecast
A more humid, potentially wetter summer is on the cards for the upper North Island — but that doesn’t mean people should go cancelling their Coromandel holiday plans.
A new outlook shows New Zealand is at a “near normal” risk of catching the fall-out of tropical cyclones over the coming November to April season.
While an ex-tropical cyclone typically edges within 550km of the country around once every season, bringing with it significant wind, waves and rainfall, there was a possibility of more than one rolling in from the southwest Pacific this time.
Current background climate conditions suggest that if a system comes close to New Zealand, there was a greater probability of it passing east of Auckland and the North Island. Under the influence of neutral to weak La Nina conditions, meteorologists have predicted between eight and 10 named cyclones hitting the southwest Pacific, with five to six of them expected to be severe.
“For New Zealand, the key message is the fact that the seas to the north of the country remain quite warm,” said meteorologist Georgina Griffiths of MetService, which annually works with Niwa and other agencies on the outlook. “North of Taupo, you may expect more of a La Nina-like flavour, which would include some sub-tropical rain at times, long dry spells in between, and warmer, more humid, conditions. “It has a lot more easterlies — that’s what we are seeing for the next three months, and we’ve already seen a really wet run for the North Island for the last few weeks.” The cyclone report followed Niwa’s latest seasonal outlook for the next three months, predicting that temperatures were “very likely” to be above average for the northern half of the North Island, with rainfall totals equally likely to be either near or above normal.
But Griffiths added that those already planning Christmas camping holidays shouldn’t panic.
“A climate forecast isn’t particularly helpful from an ‘am I going to get wet in my tent’ point of view,” she said. “As always, you are just going to have to listen to the actual weather forecast across the core two-week holiday period.”