Heavy snow and rain close roads in the South Island

Heavy snow and rain have closed roads in the South Island, but the cold front is expected to decrease on Sunday.

While Nelson and Marlborough got heavy rain overnight, other parts of the South Island, including the Canterbury highlands and the Alpine passes, received the greatest amount of snow this year.

Ski resort manager James McKenzie of Mt Hutt said 40cm of snow had fallen overnight and they hoped to open later Sunday morning once the access road was cleared.

It was the biggest snowfall of the season so far, he said.

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The Mt Dobson ski area in the Canterbury highlands was closed on Sunday after 12cm of snow fell overnight.

Hanmer Springs also got a lot of snow with a fall of about 6 inches.

Heavy snow closed off State Highway 7 through the Lewis Pass from the Hanmer exit to Springs Junction.

SH73 from Arthur’s Pass to Porters Pass between Springfield and Otira is also closed.

Elsewhere, heavy rain closed off roads in the top of the South Island.

A Metservice spokesman said 94mm of rain fell in the Rai Valley, Marlborough, in the 24 hours to 7am on Sunday and 67mm in Blenheim.

Flood closed SH1 between Awatere Valley Rd to Seddon and SH63 at Renwick between Anglesea St and Alma St.

A rock fall also closed off SH6 between Punakaiki and Greymouth.

The rain has already abated and Metservice predicts conditions will improve by Sunday afternoon.

Meanwhile, residents of Christchurch were spared even more flooding after a week of rain, the city recorded the wettest July ever in history.

Christchurch airport recorded 38mm of rain overnight, while the MetService said 20mm fell in the city.

However, a northwestern system will bring some calm to the east coast of the South Island this week.

Christchurch was set to return to warmer temperatures on Tuesday with an expected high of 17C.

But it would be another wet week on the west coast, the spokesman said.