Aotearoa on the sunny side for holiday
But Niwa predicts we are in for another big soaking from low-pressure systems later this month
Despite a wet and wild week across the North Island, the long weekend is geared up for dry weather for most parts of the country — perfect for hunting for Easter eggs with the kids.
That includes southern cities such as Christchurch and Dunedin where temperatures could reach summery highs of 25C and 26C respectively. Hastings in the north is also set to enjoy a warm weekend with temperatures up to 26C.
But it won’t be all sunshine and warmth with MetService picking some rain for the South Island and even brief snowfall in Fiordland, Mt Aspiring/Tititea and Mt Cook/Aoraki National Parks.
In the North Island though, it looks to be dry and mostly sunny, although breezy for the morning egg hunt.
The long weekend is expected to end with a typical westerly flow, but holidaymakers can be assured of a dry run on the road for travels home.
Today the North Island will be mostly fine, with a few isolated showers set to clear in Auckland and Coromandel and highs of 22C and 20C respectively. Fine conditions are forecast from Waikato to Wellington, including Bay of Plenty, and the Wairarapa.
In Gisborne and Hawke’s Bay, showers are expected to clear in the afternoon.
Further south it will be mainly fine across Canterbury, Otago and Southland with a few showers in the west, turning to rain tomorrow.
In the North Island, Sunday is looking fine in the east, and cloudy across the rest of the island with isolated showers in Northland and gale northerlies in Wellington.
The conditions will be similar into the Easter Monday holiday with cloudy periods in the west with isolated showers and fine in the east.
But looking further forward, the country is in for another big soaking later this month, with Niwa picking plenty more rainfall for northern regions between now and mid-winter.
The agency issued a seasonal outlook forecasting near-to-above average temperatures everywhere in the country for the next three months.
“The chance for a colder-thanaverage late autumn and early winter is pretty low, and continues a run of unusual warmth,” Niwa forecaster Ben Noll said.
With that warmth comes the wet — rainfall levels in the north and west of the North Island, particularly, are expected to be either near or above normal. That, however, contrasts with a near-to-below normal rainfall outlook for the South Island. Noll said this trend would be “something to keep an eye on” given hydro lake and soil moisture levels remained low across much of the south, following a particularly dry summer.
On the other hand, he added, fewer freezing days might lessen the demand on hydro resources for power.
A La Nina climate system that had delivered the country an unusual mix of weather over summer was also expected to soon fade away completely.
But first, the agency was picking more low pressure systems this month — with an “elevated chance” for heavy rain around mid-April.
That was largely down to the presence of a climate driver called the Madden-Julian oscillation (MJO).
The largest element of the intra-seasonal variability in the tropical atmosphere, the MJO was a pulse of rain and thunderstorms that circled the globe every 30 to 40 days.
In certain phases, it could power weather patterns and drive big downpours over New Zealand.
Noll said this week’s MJO-fuelled weather brought rainfall totals ranging from 40mm to 80mm across the country. Among some of the most drenched places were Hamilton — where 65mm fell in 12 hours on Tuesday, equivalent to 80 per cent of its monthly normal — and the interior Bay of Plenty, which received about 77mm on Wednesday.
That rain had been welcome, with virtually all of the North Island, along with eastern and much of inland South Island, running drier than usual at the start of the week.