A striking Mt Taranaki looms over New Plymouth. Photo / Mike Scott
Reports of cars sliding and crashing off icy roads in Taranaki’s Egmont National Park today were a sign of a chilly week ahead for the entire country.
But amid widespread wet and frosty conditions, Auckland is expected to be the driest place to be.
MetService meteorologist Braydon White said the coldest places this week will be the “usual suspects”, with Queenstown, Wānaka, Alexandra, Dunedin and Invercargill all expected to see sub-zero temperatures.
“We’re going to be consistently seeing those cold, frosty mornings for most parts of the country. High temperatures start to ease later in the week, but you’re still going to be feeling like it’s properly winter and you’ll be wanting those big winter jackets.”
Across the country, cold southerlies will be sticking around for the first few days of the week, with a “big ridge pushing on, which will keep the cold air around until it becomes fairly stationary”, White said.
Wellington is expecting “widespread frost” later in the week - something uncommon for the region. Temperatures will range from 4C to 13C.
Meanwhile, the only place to feel somewhat warm will be Northland, with highs of 15C to 16C throughout the week.
A consistent southerly flow for the first part of the week will bring lots of showers to Eastern and Southern areas.
White said Gisborne will be among the “least pleasant places to be”.
It is expected to rain every day until Thursday, with a high of 13C forecast across that period. However, it will improve, with sunny conditions expected on Friday and Saturday.
White called Auckland “the pick this week” when it comes to places to be, as it “looks to be pretty sheltered in the southeasterly flow”.
“They might see one or two showers, but it’s not going to be too bad.”
The City of Sails will see lows of 4C to 6C, with high temperatures ranging from 14C to 15C.
At the start of winter, the prediction was for it to be warmer and wetter season than usual.
And on July 4, Auckland broke its maximum record for that month with a high temperature of 20.8C.
“Auckland has been fairly mild. We’ve had a few runs of these, similar to what we’ve got now, these big southerlies that come through,” White said.
“Then a high comes in and sits over the country, ending up with really clear, dry, frosty winter mornings. Auckland’s had a few of those, but nothing out of the ordinary for winter. They definitely had some warmer days as well.”
However, many parts of the country have seen chilling drops in temperatures over the past few weeks.
With just under a month of winter left, White says it’s “tricky” to know if the weather will calm down or not.
“Looks like we’re seeing a fairly average end to winter. Temperatures don’t look too extreme one way or the other,” White said.
“[I’m] not seeing a tonne of rainfall, but it’s always possible if a big southerly suddenly comes through and dumps a bunch of rain and snow.
“It looks like your average cold winter, with the occasional southerly outbreak, like we’ve got at the moment. And then more mild temperatures in between.”
Meanwhile, vehicles were sliding off icy roads en route to Mt Taranaki today.
Emergency services were called to Pembroke Rd, Egmont National Park, after a report of “several vehicles” sliding on ice and coming off the road. No one was injured, but the road was closed due to “extremely icy” conditions.
Motorists were advised to avoid the area if possible.
White said the showers pushing into the country will “slowly ease” during the week.
“So those icy conditions from showers are going to calm down and be less of a problem. However, given the widespread cool temperatures and light winds that we’re going to see across a lot of NZ, frosty roads will still be a concern,” White said.
Motorists in frosty areas have also been advised to increase the following distance between their vehicles and other cars.
Malisha Kumar is a multimedia journalist based in Hamilton. She joined the Waikato Herald in 2023 after working for Radio 1XX in Whakatāne.