Record December rainfall in Gisborne’s after hot and dry start

Rain falls on downtown Gisborne on Boxing Day. It was the district's wettest December on record - 229 millimetres in total.

December was a month of weather contradictions for Gisborne, producing a rainfall record and one of the city’s hottest days of 2024, according to MetService.

MetService meteorologist Gerard Bellam said the previous highest December rainfall recorded by MetService in Gisborne was 204.4mm in 1954.

Gisborne Harbour Board records dating from 1878 show an even wetter December than the previous MetService record, with the last month of the year in 1893, totalling 222.5mm.

The December 2024 rainfall recorded by MetService in Gisborne surpassed both with a total of 229.9mm.

Bellam said the wettest day was Boxing Day with 88.7mm of rainfall, but the wettest December day in Gisborne according to MetService was December 21, 1954, with 91.7mm.

Sunlight was in short supply at only 189.4 hours of sun over the month.

This was 79.9 hours shorter than the 30-year average of 269.3 for December.

The least sunny December on record for Gisborne was in 1968 when there were only 164 hours of sun - an average per day of just over five hours.

Surface flooding on State Highway 35 past the Awapuni Rd/Grey St roundabout on Boxing Day. December was wet, wet, wet - featuring record rainfall for the month and sunshine hours well short of the month's 30-year average.

“It was a month of two halves, though, because the first half of the month you only had 7.9mm of rain and there were quite hot days there as well,” Bellam said.

“Three days got over 30[C] and a few others in the high 20s.”

Bellam said the hottest day of the month recorded by MetService in Gisborne was 31.5C on December 5.

The official hottest day of 2024 was 31.9C on February 6.

MetService meteorologist Mmathapelo Makgabutlane said in a statement there would be rain in Tairāwhiti until Saturday evening when it was expected to clear out.