Our Forecasters & Weather Watchers

About WeatherWatch.co.nz

WeatherWatch.co.nz is the first of its kind in New Zealand. Privately owned WeatherWatch.co.nz's goal is to bring you breaking weather news first, and provide truly long range predictions that answer this very important question "How will the weather affect me?".  

Not only do we cover all the breaking weather news across New Zealand but we also provide detailed forecasts, and the latest breaking weather stories from around the world. 

We also enjoy answering your weather questions and making a community of enthusiasts who can share their weather readings, predictions and photographs with each other.

MEDIA - If you're from a media organisation wanting to speak to our forecasters please use our Media Contacts Form

(Emails sent to this address are checked 24/7 and are for the use of media organisations only)

Philip Duncan – Head Weather Analyst

Since I was a little kid growing up in the Bay of Plenty I have had a huge passion for the weather.  Storms here and abroad capture my attention - but growing up in the rural communities of Te Puke, and then Te Aroha in the eastern Waikato, taught me about the importance of "good and bad" weather.  While hot, sunny, weather may be great for holidaymakers - it may not be good news for farmers. A rain storm may be good for the garden, but bad if it's your day off work.  Clearly understanding what's good for someone in the city may not be good for someone farming is one of the reasons I work at Country99TV as their forecaster - I love to help the farming community as much as possible and was thrilled when we established a partnership with Fonterra early in 2011 to help with monthly predictions for them.

But there are lot of people living in our cities and towns.  nzherald.co.nz helps us produce weather videos which help not just rural sectors but also those who want to know when to hang the washing out, when to plan that BBQ, or when's a good time to head out fishing.

My background has always revolved around weather and media. I don't consider myself a journalist, but enjoy writing weather news stories which are used by the media all over New Zealand and occasionally by CNN, SKY and other international media outlets.

I worked in radio fulltime from 1996 until 2010 in various roles from radio announcing to management.  My radio contacts all over New Zealand allows me to connect daily with Kiwis in every region and I provide regular interviews from the West Coast to Auckland, Southland to Northland.  These interviews are provided through our contract with The Radio Network (who initially supported me to set up WeatherWatch.co.nz in 2005 and owned it up until the end of 2010).

I am proud to run WeatherWatch.co.nz and our commitment to public safety is always at the core of our business. We work closely with Civil Defence in Auckland but also on a national level where possible.  We have a close relationship with NIWA and also GeoNet - as occasionally earthquakes in this country make the headlines.  Our readers, viewers and listeners expect us to cover most natural disasters, not just weather, so we're proud to have great working relationships with these organisations.

The title "Weather Analyst" was created by The Radio Network and has stuck ever since.  We use data from meteorologists and scientists here in New Zealand and abroad and it's our job to analyse that data, add our own local expertise and local knowledge and create a product which we think is more accurate, more interesting and most importantly - reliable.

In short - we bring the weather to life and make it easy for you to quickly take what you need.

- Philip Duncan

If you want to email Philip, you can contact him here.

Follow Philip on Twitter here.

Richard Green – Weather Analyst

Richard's passion for weather started at the tender age of 4, when he used to go outside and play in the gutters in his gumboots during rain squalls in Invercargill!

He doesn't do it quite so often now but got into live weather reporting 10 years ago on CTV in Christchurch where he presented the evening bulletins for 3 years in conjunction with his weather reporting on a local radio station ' Canterbury On Air'.

The next step, with Richard's eye still glancing skyward, saw him take the 'Weatherguy' role with Newstalk ZB.
Each Monday and Friday morning, he delivered his thoughts on the nations weather.

In Christchurch, he adds an extra touch by looking locally at Canterbury's conditions and what's instore for the red and black province.

As a WeatherWatch.co.nz team member, he enjoys the challenge of providing forecasts which hopefully most folk can relate to!

Email Richard here.

Our "Eyes & Ears"

Another thing that makes WeatherWatch.co.nz unique, is the fact that we have “eyes and ears” in every main town and city across New Zealand. With up to 30 official “Weather Watchers” providing storm alerts and eyewitness accounts on local weather conditions in your town when needed.

“It’s been a long time since a weather organisation had people based in all the main centres” says head weather analyst Philip Duncan.

“Computerised weather stations are extremely important but I like to use this analogy: A plane can land entirely on computers – but if you were a passenger wouldn’t you prefer a pilot in the cockpit looking out the window?  Weather forecasting is the same…there are so many things computers can miss so having locals feeding information to WeatherWatch.co.nz is vital if we want to be up to date and accurate”.