Heavy rain, snow tipped this week
Battle of weather systems predicted over the country Nature’s cues guide voyagers to goal
Northern parts of the country could be hammered by heavy rain this week, while the south could get snow, in what one forecaster has described as a battle of weather systems.
A low-pressure system is expected to approach the Far North from the north Tasman Sea early this week, bringing rain and strong northeasterly winds to northern areas.
For Northland, especially about the eastern hills, MetService reported a “low confidence of warnable amounts” of rain tomorrow with a slightly higher chance of heavy rain on Wednesday and Thursday.
Niwa is forecasting 62mm and 60.8mm of rain for Whangarei and Kaitaia respectively on Thursday, along with 21.8mm for Auckland.
There is also a moderate chance of northeast gales becoming severe in exposed parts of Northland on Wednesday and Thursday.
For Auckland, Great Barrier Island and Coromandel Peninsula, there is a low chance of heavy rain on Wednesday and Thursday, along with northeast gales in exposed areas across those regions and Waikato.
“For Waikato, Bay of Plenty and the ranges of Gisborne, there is low confidence a heavy rain warning will be required on Thursday,” MetService reported.
But that low would come up against a ridge of high pressure that was expected to remain over central and southern New Zealand for much of next week.
MetService meteorologist April Clark said the combination of the two systems could create “undercutting or overcutting situations”.
“It essentially means we could get snow in the South Island as well, because you’ve got that moist air coming over creating rain, but also cool temperatures with a front in the lower south which can cause snow, and that would be on Thursday and early Friday as well.
“That’s why we call these things complex lows, which sounds like a cop-out, but it’s actually not, because it’s two systems coming together and they interact and that’s what causes these situations.”
WeatherWatch forecaster Philip Duncan said it was not clear which of the incoming low or high-pressure ridge would prevail.
“The high and the low are going to fight it out a little bit — it’s a battle of two air-pressure systems . . . I think we are going to see a mixture of rain, drizzle and dry spells.”
Duncan said the low was likely to hover around New Zealand for a week — and some regions could see several days of rain. No modern navigation instruments guided a Polynesian voyaging canoe during a three-year journey around the globe with stops in New Zealand, South Africa, the Americas and Pacific Islands.
About a dozen crew members for each leg of the voyage relied only on nature’s cues — ocean swells, stars, wind, birds — and their own naau, or gut to sail the Hokulea 74,000km to 19 countries, spreading a message of malama honua: caring for the Earth.
Tauranga navigators Frank Kawe and Jack Thatcher formed the Maori contingent on the double-hulled canoe, whose name means star of gladness, during the southernmost leg to New Zealand in 2014, when it sailed from Whangarei to Nelson.
The canoe has especially strong ties to New Zealand, forged on its first visit to Northland.
“There are five main tribes here but Sir James Henare wanted to honour them by making them the sixth tribe of the region,” Thatcher told Maori Television in 2014.
“Hence the tribal name of Ngati Ruawahia. That was given to the crew on board Hokulea by Northland elders.”
Kawe was there to greet the canoe on the completion of its epic voyage to Hawaii on Saturday. Thousands welcomed the Hokulea when it entered a channel off the island of Oahu and tied up to a floating dock with Diamond Head in the distance.
Ka’iulani Murphy, 38, an apprentice navigator, said the journey taught her the value of ancient Polynesian maritime techniques.
“We really are sailing in their wake. We had to relearn what our ancestors had mastered.”
The toughest part was dealing with cloud cover and trying to hold the right speed so the escort boat could keep up, she said, adding she enjoyed the fish the crew caught. — AP