Parts of the South Island have felt the chill this week but looking back to 1977 and Otago and Southland witnessed snowflakes falling as daytime highs struggled to 3 and 4 degrees.

Other events to take place during this weekend in our past include…

1911 Murchison experienced cloudless skies for 8 consecutive days and although the nights were cool, daytime temperatures neared the 20 degree mark for basically a week.

1943 Whakatane experienced very strong northerlies during the night of the 8th with a top gust of approxiamately125kph

1957 Southerlies roared up eastern parts of the South Island and delivered almost 75mm of rain in South Canterbury with waterlogged paddocks and surface flooding reported on some local roads.

1988 Warm nor’ west winds continued battering Canterbury with temperatures topping 28 degrees and strong wind gusts making driving conditions over some parts of the plains difficult.

Overseas

1899 Tremendous winds hammered parts of Europe as a very deep low descended from the Arctic which caused problems for shipping with huge swells and on land many forests were decimated.

1966 Alaska enjoyed a prolonged warm spell with temperatures up to 12 degrees above normal for October and was more reminiscent of July.