Tropical cyclones settle down across region

The changeable weather in Auckland City. Photo / Richard Robinson

Tropical cyclones Tomas and Ului appear to have sapped away a fair chunk of energy from the south-west Pacific tropics with mostly settled weather now across the region.

As we come towards the end of the cyclone season it's no real surprise to see deep lows forming less often in the tropics and appear more often south of the country.

However as we make this shift through Autumn towards Winter we may well see a few sub-tropical lows forming – and the computer models are already picking up the possibility of one next week. This will bring an easterly flow back in to northern New Zealand and could bring rain anywhere from Northland to Fiordland.

The rain that fell last night was, in my mind, pretty hopeless for our driest regions however some got a solid hour or so of rain.

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The bad news is that dry weather will prevail for the rest of this month with current computer models indicating that this sub-tropical low will most likely drift in to the Tasman rather than down over our driest regions – again, all thanks to high pressure over much of the country.

In the South Island next week expect more nor'westers – so hot again in the east and possibly a little windy too. I guess you can't complain too much after a miserable summer in Canterbury – now the temperatures are much higher.

So with March coming to an end and April almost here - what can we expect for Easter? Well it's just a tiny bit too early to be certain but conditions around the country are proving to be very changeable. It's been the pattern for the past couple of months really but things now are speeding up and moving through much faster.

At this stage our long range forecast shows sou'easters over northern New Zealand at the end of next week, possibly indicating a large high exiting the country out in to the Pacific. What moves in behind that high is still, as they say, up in the air.

We'll have our first Easter forecast out by this Saturday.