11am Update

The nor’west winds have started to move into the lower part of the South Island.  While it’s still cold and calm in Otago, with temperatures only around 4 to 9 degrees, Southland is up to 12 degrees with gusts to 60km/h.  In Auckland a cold southerly means it’s only around 13 at the moment with just a breeze reaching 25km/h – enough to make it feel more like 6 or 7.

Temperatures are expected to continue to rise in the South Island’s southern and eastern areas today as that nor’wester continues to spread across the island.

Earlier update

October is usually a very windy, stormy, month and this year is no different as spring gales continue to hammer parts of the country.  Aucklanders shivered in the wind yesterday as the wind chill kicked in with a ‘feels like’ temperature of just 10 degrees during the afternoon.  Today is looking similar with those cold sou’westers blowing in straight off the Tasman Sea.

But other regions will warm up today after a chilly start thanks to a building nor’wester.  The South Island will feel the warmth in central and eastern areas as the winds build during the day reaching Wellington this afternoon and Hawkes Bay overnight tonight.  Temperatures are likely to bounce back around the 20 degree mark for some of those eastern regions.

“The winds are being created by a huge high north of the country and more of those spring storms in the Southern Ocean.  New Zealand is again in the ‘squeeze zone’ between these systems” says head weather analyst Philip Duncan.

The warmer winds are likely to arrive over northern New Zealand during tomorrow or into the weekend. 

Mr Duncan says Wellington and other central New Zealand regions are likely to see more gales across the weekend.   “This is typical for October and I wouldn’t be surprised if we see a continuation of these gales over the next month with conditions likely to calm down in November”.

“We’ve been lucky so far this Spring with very little in the way of wind related damage…and we haven’t seen the big lightning storms in the west but the next 4 to 6 weeks will be the real testing ground” says Duncan.  “Put it this way, things are likely to get worse before they get better”.