A very wet start to the week

MetService News Release
Monday, 09 Jun 2014

A very wet start to the week

Heavy rain brings a wet start to the week for many parts of New Zealand,most notably the northern parts of both the North and South Islands. This rain will be driven south by an active area of low pressure to the west of the country, and is expected to persist across many parts of New Zealand for much of this week.

Severe weather warnings for heavy rain have already been issued for Northland down to the Coromandel, as well as for Nelson and parts of Marlborough.

"With the low pressure off to our west, we are going to find ourselves stuck in a very moist northeasterly feed of air," MetService meteorologist John Law said. "It will be areas exposed to that northeasterly flow that bear the brunt of the rainfall - for example the Coromandel and northwestern parts of Nelson."

Cantabrians will also be wise to keep a weather eye on the radar this week,with more rain forecast for the region. "The heaviest rainfall for Canterbury will be up into the High Country and about the foothills. However, it still looks like rather a wet week for Christchurch and the Plains, with rain pushing in from the east," Law said. Rainfall totals for Christchurch are likely to be in the region of 40 to 50mm over the 48 hours through to Wednesdaymorning.

A dowsing of rain is also on the cards for Auckland for the start of the week. "We're in for an extremely wet few days," advised MetService Auckland forecaster Georgina Griffiths. "It has been a long, long time since we've had the "Old Man Nor'easter" bring in this type of extended rain."

The rain will make setting up for National Fieldays at Mystery Creek a rather soggy affair, but the weather looks set to slowly improve through the week with some sunnier spells returning for the final few days. A regular at Fieldays, MetService will be in the Pavilion again this year - so come and visit the team at stand PD3.

Keep up to date with the latest forecasts and any watches/warnings atmetservice.com or on mobile devices at m.metservice.com. You can also follow our updates on MetService TV, @metservice on Twitter and at blog.metservice.com.

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