Wintry temperatures will continue into the weekend and another unusually cold night is expected tonight, MetService says.
This comes after a frigid start for many across the country today. Tekapo was a frigid -7°C, and Dunedin and Mt Cook airports were both -5°C.
MetService meteorologist Ngaire Wotherspoon said: “The current cold snap isn't going anywhere, and tonight (Thursday) is likely to be the coldest of all.”
Her colleague John Law said that if there were clear skies, temperatures were expected to drop.
“Another very cold night, icy conditions, maybe even some hard frost in some of those inland parts of Canterbury and in some of those more inland parts of the central North Island.”
In the early hours of Friday morning, temperatures in central parts of Auckland will drop to 3 degrees Celsius, with temperatures below freezing for parts of the Waikato, Central High Country and towards parts of Manawatū and Wairarapa.
Auckland can expect a high of 14 degrees on Friday, Wellington is set to reach 13 degrees Celsius and Tauranga should see a high of 15 degrees Celsius before another cold night arrives on Saturday.
Christchurch can expect -4 degrees Celsius and a cold and frosty morning on Friday.
Showers were forecast in the far northern parts of the South Island towards the end of Friday.
“There will be plenty of clear skies for the end of the week. Showers are forecast for Friday in southern and eastern areas as a weak front moves north, but we expect widespread dry weather for the weekend,” Wotherspoon said.
Relief from the cold conditions was on the horizon as southerly winds eased over the weekend, but remaining cold air was expected to persist into next week, according to MetService.
“These cold nights will continue for a while, but warmer and wetter weather should return later in the week,” Wotherspoon said.
The weekend
MetService said showers would ease in the east of the North Island on Saturday, with a few early showers around Wellington and Taranaki, while elsewhere on the motu would be fine.
For the South Island, showers were expected in the far south, as well as some morning showers around Canterbury and Marlborough, but fine elsewhere.
Sunday was forecast to be mostly good for most. However, isolated showers were forecast west from Taranaki to Wellington, and for Buller, northern Westland and the far south.