Your Local Weather Friday 22nd June 2012

[JennyLeez]

Report current or recent weather conditions at your location or elsewhere for Friday 22nd June below.
You do not need a weather station, just look out your window and tell us what is going on above you.
If your conditions change, let us know. We will keep our Twitter, Google + and Facebook followers informed during the day.

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[ato2]

New Plymouth: 8 degrees (4 at airport). Partly cloudy, dry, light SE breeze

[Rwood]

Looks like a sunny day - mostly - coming up, for the first time in a week!

[ato2]

Sun good!

[Derek]

Beautiful clear morning here in Waitakere, 7.3°C and still falling a little.  As usual for here, its damp outside, helped by 5 mm of rain yesterday.
Mainly sunny today with a bit of luck, with a high of about 13°C

[Rwood]

Looks like a sunny day - mostly - coming up, for the first time in a week!
Sun good!
[/quote]

When the NIWA summary for May includes the stats. table, will post some comments.

Regarding the new EWS for New Plymouth, I think it is probably giving totals about 3%-5% (say 70 to 110 hours per annum) higher than the manual equipment did, which should be borne in mind when assessing records. More data needed of course (there was only a short period of overlap last December). Most conversions so far have shown a significant increase, with an unfortunate effect with Whakatane where the average has gone up by at least 7% by the looks of things. Some places' increases have been quite unreasonable, but they are not contenders for "sunniest town".

[TonyC]

Port Robinson 8.25am

Fine sunny morning with some high cloud. Wind from the WSW gusting up to 19kmh, but in the main, moderate. Temperature 6.4° after a low of 4.5° and heading for a high of 12°. Outlook for the rest of the day, fine.

[bett]

Norfolk Island high of 20`c today with light Easterly breeze.  blue skis...just like a spring day ahead again today.  Sunny fine day.  heavy dew looked like a frost this morning.  it's only 12`C inside, but 15`c outside ... here comes a wonderful day. 

[JennyLeez]

Wairoa at 09:00
Sunny, Mainly Calm and Cool.
The Over Night Temp Low was  7.9 °C
Rainfall of  0.6 mm since midnight.
Rainfall last 24 hours 3.3 mm
Current Temp Outside is  11.0 °C
Latest Wind Gust  5.0 km/h
Baro  1016.7 hPa

[Hank13]

Ashburton @  09:02 AM
Overcast and very cool after a foggy night then a frost
Currant Temp.  -0.3°C   
Min Temp.-1.1°C @  7:00 AM
Current wind. 0.0 km/h,WNW
Min Grass -5.5°C @ 6:22 AM
 

[ato2]

Sun good!

When the NIWA summary for May includes the stats. table, will post some comments.

Regarding the new EWS for New Plymouth, I think it is probably giving totals about 3%-5% (say 70 to 110 hours per annum) higher than the manual equipment did, which should be borne in mind when assessing records. More data needed of course (there was only a short period of overlap last December). Most conversions so far have shown a significant increase, with an unfortunate effect with Whakatane where the average has gone up by at least 7% by the looks of things. Some places' increases have been quite unreasonable, but they are not contenders for "sunniest town".
I wish there were about 2 or 3 years overlap with them. Re the pre EWS records: one thing I suspected- and I cannot say I have any evidence for it, was that when we would have say wall to wall sun all day, and say the daylight hours were ten hours long, then the total sunshine reported for the day seemed to be less than the hours of daylight, despite a cloudless day.
I could be wrong, but it sometimes seemed that way. It wasn't a huge amount but noticeable- maybe 12.8 hrs reported in a 13 hr day, for example.

[Weather Display]

effects of the next tasman system being felt here already
wind has gone more WSW and temperature has come up

[Rex]

Mahia Beach Front

Mostly cloudy around 75% coverage.
Light SW wind
Dry.

[Sara]

Cloud cover with a NW arch. Sporadic rays of sunshine.
Temperature 8.1C
Humidity 86%
Barometer 1011.2hPa Steady.
Wind Direction E
Wind Speed 1.7km/k

[Rwood]

When the NIWA summary for May includes the stats. table, will post some comments.

Regarding the new EWS for New Plymouth, I think it is probably giving totals about 3%-5% (say 70 to 110 hours per annum) higher than the manual equipment did, which should be borne in mind when assessing records. More data needed of course (there was only a short period of overlap last December). Most conversions so far have shown a significant increase, with an unfortunate effect with Whakatane where the average has gone up by at least 7% by the looks of things. Some places' increases have been quite unreasonable, but they are not contenders for "sunniest town".
I wish there were about 2 or 3 years overlap with them. Re the pre EWS records: one thing I suspected- and I cannot say I have any evidence for it, was that when we would have say wall to wall sun all day, and say the daylight hours were ten hours long, then the total sunshine reported for the day seemed to be less than the hours of daylight, despite a cloudless day.
I could be wrong, but it sometimes seemed that way. It wasn't a huge amount but noticeable- maybe 12.8 hrs reported in a 13 hr day, for example.

That's quite correct, but was normal for the manual C/S recorders. The standard practice when assessing % of possible values was to subtract 30 minutes per day (as a reasonable average over the year) from the astronmical day-length (minus a further "horizon loss" value for any obstructions affecting the instrument for the remainder of the day), because the attenuated rays would not generally trigger a card-burn. The EWS instruments can react to a small number of photons and are not affected that way near sunrise and sunset. However, complications arise because they can over-record feeble sunlight.

In a variety of circumstances one type can record more than the other, but overall in NZ so far without any doubt the EWSs record more unless deliberately calibrated downwards a bit in some way. I think they should look at the most anomalous cases (over +10% in some instances!) and alter the settings a bit. A further complication arises if the new instrument has a different (usually better) exposure than the old one had. But there isn't time available for these exercises given staff constraints. Meanwhile I think the 2 sets of readings should be ranked separately, especially when announcing site records (sometimes they do).

[ato2]

Thanks, Rupert. The explanation clears up that mystery for me.

[Derek]

High today in Waitakere was 14.9°C, the odd shower has given a rain total of 0.8 mm.  Current temperature is 9.4°C with cloudy conditions at the moment.

[OhauitiWeather]

It looks like the two islands today are offering up different weather conditions with the north winning over the south in terms of overhead conditions.

A mostly dry Friday is on the way for North Islanders as any remaining early showers are expected to disappear first thing and reveal plenty of sunshine today although still a few cloudy spells could hang about from time to time.There's a chance that might thicken up over the sou' west corner and a few misty showers or drizzly areas could settle in later today or tonight.

The South Island saw quite a bit of sunshine yesterday however only the north and east look likely to see much of it today as an incoming frontal system appears to see cloud and rain move across western areas and slowly spill across Otago and Southland later.

Nelson Marlborough and Canterbury appear to have the best of the weather over the south but cloud building over Canterbury is a possibility.

Temperatures are set to follow the usual pattern with highest temperatures in the north and lowest temperatures over western and southern parts of the Mainland.

WeatherWatch.co.nz
http://www.weatherwatch.co.nz/content/fridays-national-forecast-20

[Te Puke Weather]

from The Metservice.
Today's high of 17 degrees was recorded in 1 place - Whangarei.

Today's lowest maximum temperature was 9 degrees and was recorded in 1 place - Alexandra.
 

Town/City   Temp Kaitaia   16° Paihia   16° Russell   16° Dargaville   15° Whangarei   17° Auckland   16° Whitianga   15° Thames   15° Tauranga   16° Whakatane   16° Hamilton   15° Te Kuiti   15° Taumarunui   13° Rotorua   13° Tokoroa   15° Taupo   13° New Plymouth   16° Gisborne   15° Napier   16° Hastings   16° Napier Hastings   15° Dannevirke   11° Masterton   14° Wanganui   16° Palmerston North   16° Levin   15° Paraparaumu   14° Wellington   14° Motueka   14° Nelson   13° Blenheim   13° Kaikoura   12°

Reefton   12° Westport   15° Greymouth   13° Hokitika   13° Milford Sound   11° Christchurch   11° Ashburton   11° Oamaru   9° Timaru   8° Mount Cook   10° Alexandra   7° Queenstown   13° Wanaka   13° Dunedin   12° Gore   10° Invercargill   11° Hanmer Springs   12° Tuatapere   13° Riverton   12° Wyndham   12° Nightcaps   12° Winton   12° Te Anau   12°