Record dry spell for Auckland
Auckland has broken its record for the longest dry spell, consecutive days with less than 1mm of rain, according to Niwa.
The city reached a new record of 40 days on Saturday, forecaster Ben Noll said.
As of Thursday, Whanga¯rei was sitting on 29 days without rain, while Kaitaia (according to Northland Age records) was on 15 days. The longest dry spell recorded by the Northland Age (consecutive days with less than 0.1mm of rain) in Kaitaia was 27 days in 1976.
Meanwhile the New Zealand Drought Index (www.niwa.co.nz/ drought-index) last week showed that a severe meteorological drought was widespread across Northland and down to the northern Waikato, along with northern Gisborne and
North Canterbury. Much of the rest of the country was unusually dry, except for the western and lower South Island.
Mr Noll said the permanent wilting point, or minimum amount of water in the soil that a plant required not to wilt or die, was being approached in Northland, Auckland and the Waikato.
The summer of 2012-13 had featured one of the worst droughts in decades for some regions, including Northland, and soil moisture deficit levels early this year were “quite similar”. In Northland’s deficits were even more severe this year.
The drought would end when soil moisture levels returned to normal, but its impacts could continue for some time after that.
Niwa’s projections indicated that drought was likely to become more frequent and severe in eastern and northern parts of New Zealand over the coming decades.