Ōtautahi being swamped with rain, no snow any more

Ōtautahi – Traditionally, one of Aotearoa’s driest cities, Christchurch, is consistently having some of the worst wet weather it has ever had.

It is currently sitting on more than 500mm of rain so far this year. That’s just over 150mm above average.

This month alone there has been well above 150mm of rain, July typically sees around 60mm. Which means the city is likely to have three times the July average before the month is up. That’s just several mm of rain short from making the top five wettest Julys ever.

In Auckland, in July, it receives about 60mm on average which is ridiculous compared to Christchurch’s climate-change dumping this year. Since the beginning of June Christchurch has had more than 205mm of rain this winter alone.

The Metservice forecaster Lewis Ferris says that is twice as much as the average for that period.

 “This winter has brought more low pressure than normal across the South Island with the lower than average pressure spreading up the east coast,” Ferris says.

“In a nutshell more low pressure means more weather. The average number of days with more than one mm of rain in Christchurch a month is 16, so far this month there has been 20 days of rain.”

Frosts and snow used to be common in Christchurch in June and July and the average rainfall for the city is about 648mm. This is changing rapidly because of climate change.

South Christchurch residents living on the banks of the swollen Ōpāwaho/Heathcote river say flooding is the worst they have seen in recent years.

The Metservice said about 42.4 millimetres of rain had fallen across Christchurch by 1.30pm today.

The Christchurch City Council has spent tens of millions of dollars in the past five years protecting people who live along the river from floodwaters.