Accurate weather forecasting requires three key ingredients – trustworthy observations, reliable computer models and experienced meteorologists. Before the computer age and the satellite era, forecasters were reliant on weather observations from land stations, ships, and balloon soundings from which they could predict the movement of high and low-pressure systems and fronts. Computer modelling has completely changed the forecasting game during the past three or four decades. Most of the MetService forecasts you read on the website or see elsewhere are the result of highly trained meteorologis ..read more

We all look out the window to see what the weather is up to. In a similar way, MetService meteorologists are always checking to make sure what they have predicted is actually happening. The forecasters may not be examining the skies themselves every few minutes, but they are monitoring a network of instruments across Aotearoa New Zealand, including those sited on our sub-tropical and sub-Antarctic islands, which are constantly feeding back crucial information to the National Forecasting Centre. Wind direction, wind speed, air temperature, humidity, rainfall, air pressure, cloud, and visibili ..read more

Some may think it’s one of those jobs which anyone might turn their hand to, but the difficulties of weather forecasting are hugely underrated. After all, there aren’t many jobs where you’re expected to predict the future. Economists are also required to make forecasts, but at least they have some control over the system they are foretelling. When it comes to weather, meteorologists have no such influence. The best weather forecasting is a mixture of science, geography, and experience. The science of meteorology is extremely complex, involving difficult atmospheric physics and chemistry, and ..read more

Tropical Cyclone Gabrielle   Prepared by Lisa Murray, Head of Weather Communications at MetService   Tues 14 Feb image: A true colour satellite image with the centre of Cyclone Gabrielle north of the Bay of Plenty. The white is the cloud and note the shadow cast by the cloud on the western side of the image.     Few weather events are as terrifying or as powerful as a tropical cyclone. MetService have tropical cyclone specialists in its National Forecasting Centre who always have their eyes on the Tropics and issue appropriate and timely warnings based on expertise, w ..read more

What do Irene, Osai, Tam and Xavier all have in common? The answer is these are all feature on the list of names for upcoming South Pacific forecasts. But who gets to pick the names and more importantly why do we name Tropical Cyclones? Giving Tropical Cyclones a name helps meteorologists track a system as it moves across large areas of ocean. These systems can bring severe weather to large areas and impact several countries so keeping track of where they are is really important. The name means that the many different weather agencies in different countries know they are all looking at the sa ..read more

With 2022 coming to an end, we thought it’d be timely to look back at the year of weather. Two words come to mind, wet and warm. Low pressure systems from the northern Tasman Sea were frequent around Aotearoa and brought a rise in both the temperature and the amount of rain that fell. Read on to find out more about MetService’s notable weather of 2022. Severe Weather Firstly, we had 53 Severe Weather Events this year and issued 182 Severe Weather Warnings, that is about an average amount, but we had several events which were far from average. We introduced our colour coded warning system in ..read more

  Hanging washing on the line may not be the most life-dependant use of MetService forecasts when compared to farming, electricity generation or adventuring into the mountains.  However, significantly more of us do it, and the environmental, economic and health benefits add up. Clothes line and weather forecast users have every right to be proud of their skill and bravery in drying clothes outside in New Zealand’s changeable weather. A June 2017 Canstar Blue survey showed that 75% of New Zealanders have a clothes line, yet 20% of those admit to using a drier even when it was sunny ..read more

In recent years the islands of Vanuatu have been showing signs of increased volcanic activity. The New Zealand Metservice plays an important role in the monitoring of these volcanoes, as they are the Volcanic Ash Advisory Centre (VAAC Wellington) for the region, one of only 9 centres around the world as shown in the map below. If any of these volcanoes (or any others within the area of responsibility) were to emit a significant amount of ash during an eruption this would pose a threat to air traffic safety, and appropriate warnings would need to be issued to ensure the safety of aircraft ..read more

Whether you actively seek the thrill of a good lightning storm or you need to make sure your nervous dog is inside in your protective arms when a thunderstorm hits, MetService has got your back. MetService has an experienced team of specialist meteorologists who take care of what we call 'mesoscale forecasting' – that is, the forecasting of weather features that are very small in size but can be very intense in nature, e.g. thunderstorms, squalls etc. The relatively small size of these weather features is what makes it a challenge when communicating their potential threat to you and your ..read more

As weather forecasters, here at MetService we spend a lot of our time poring through data: data from weather stations, data from satellites and radar, from weather balloons and also webcams. This information is all useful for understanding what the weather is doing right now – but how do we know what might happen in the future? Understanding the current weather helps us understand what might come next, but information from numerical weather models also plays a very important part. Numerical Weather Prediction (or NWP) is the science of forecasting the weather by using the governing physical e ..read more