Cold frosty weather to be replaced with wet in Northland this week

Frost at Whangarei Town Basin.PHOTO/ Michael Cunningham

Clear skies, light wind and calm night conditions were the ingredients needed to send Northland's morning temperatures plummeting to the lowest this winter season.

When it came to ideal conditions for creating a frost, Northland ticked all the boxes on Monday and a blanket of white frost covered parts of the region.

Extra thick socks were being pulled on and another layer of winter warmers worn as the temperature dropped to 1C in Whangarei.

However, MetService forecaster Tuporo Marsters said in sheltered inland areas the temperatures would have been zero, if not even colder.

Kerikeri was only slightly warmer on 3C, while Kaitaia had a low of 5C.

Mr Marsters said "the cold stuff" formed just before sunrise when the air temperature dropped.

"In previous days, there has been some cloud cover and coastal breezes coming in.

"Combine clear skies and calm night conditions with a big high pressure system parked over the North Island and it's ideal conditions for chilly temperatures."

Sunday morning was a cold one too with Whangarei officially recording 3C, Kaitaia dipped to 4C and Kerikeri was slightly above freezing on 1C.

There were no temperature readings for Dargaville as it appeared there was only a rain recorder and no temperature sensor at the MetService site.

If you thought it was cold in Northland yesterday spare a thought for those at Mt Cook Airport where MetService recorded -8C. Lake Tekapo dipped to -8 and Alexandra -7.

In the North Island Waiouru was -7, Taupo -5 and Rotorua -3, as was Paeroa.

The perfect conditions for frost to form in Northland were expected to disappear overnight Tuesday and give way to some wet weather on Wednesday.

"Cloud comes in from the west and a low crosses Northland. There will be a chance of heavy falls."

But the good news is the weather should improve just in time for the weekend.

Earlier in July, Kaitaia got down to 3.9C and Kerikeri was down to 5.8C.

And while it seemed cold in Northland this past week, it wasn't as cold as our coldest day last year. Last July 1, the official overnight low in Kaitaia hit 0.3C, Whangarei had an overnight low of 1.3C, Kerikeri's was 1.3C.