New sites put city's weather on the map

Three Wanganui sites have been registered with the new MetService feature Your Weather, giving the city access to more weather data.

MetService has recently introduced the system, which allows anyone with a weather station to feed the information to MetService.

Currently weather information from one private station near Lake Wiritoa is being displayed on the website.

The "Wiritoa Woolshed" station has regularly been displaying temperatures 2C warmer than the Wanganui airport.

A MetService spokesperson said two more stations, one near Durie Hill and one near Kowhai Park, had been registered but information was not yet being fed through.

Official MetService readings for Wanganui are taken at the airport, where temperatures are usually several degrees cooler than other parts of the city.

It has long been the contention of many Wanganui weather-watchers that the official readings are unrealistically low and reflect badly on the city's image.

Your Weather is run in conjunction with Met Office (the UK's national weather service) to source weather station data from the WOW (Weather Observations Website) System.