A major storm about to hit New Zealand
Just an hour or so ago
I suspect astrologer, Ken Ring is going to have to eat humble pie along with the rest of the kiwi male scoffers.
Technically there’s no cyclone coming, but still watch out.
Science is our attempt at precision. That is why actual words are important. To use a wrong word or a word that does not mean anything, is pseudoscience. So it is with ex-tropical cyclones. Cyclones are real, but an ex-cyclone is not, being one that died away or morphed into a low pressure zone or a depression, which is not anymore a cyclone. To call a cyclone ex-tropical, in today’s language, is tautological. It is like saying a Fijian man comes from Fiji. Well, unless I misheard you, and there is another Fiji, where else? So does ex-tropical cyclone mean a system is ex-tropical, meaning nothing, because what would mean something would be a tropical cyclone; or is it an ex-cyclone, which also, by definition, is nothing. Which is it, nothing or nothing? Nice one, meteorologists!
New Zealand only gets the remnants of storm systems, that started off as cyclones way up in the tropics, originally forming where the water is between 26-28° C. Only then is it hot enough for the fast evaporation that must occur. Then they go north or south of the equator but almost never cross the equator. In the northern hemisphere as hurricanes or typhoons, they move up and can still develop until the hot water runs out at the edge of the tropics, around Taiwan. In the southern hemisphere, as cyclones, they can move commonly from the top of Australia, moving down as far as Fiji. Beyond that they stop generating, and morph into lesser systems. So you can’t call an event the cyclone of a country if it was generated somewhere else.
You will never get into the water in NZ at 28° C. On the hottest summer’s day you will always shiver because the water is so cold, about 21° in February. The current cyclone is still located in the Coral Sea. The key is Uranus’s opposition to the moon which begins on Sunday evening and ends on Monday night, at the exact time of the 3rd Q phase, in which the moon rises around midnight. Just before midnight should be the heaviest rain action, but as soon as the moon gets clear of the horizon the intensity of the rain should cease, along with, coincidentally, the Uranus opposition!
For many of us, we will be asleep, and miss all the excitement. We will wake up to the whimpering of showers and declare that all the hype was for nothing and the event was a fizzer. But the night-time is when the drains may overflow, for I expect about 50mm to hit Auckland, not the 200mm scaremongering that they all expect, but still enough to inflict damage. After all, perigee #4 hits Auckland a few days later on the 18th, and on the following Wednesday 22nd would have been the highest tide height of the year if it wasn’t for last month’s exceptionally close perigeal moon.
Coromandel on Monday evening should receive 60-80mm, but Tauranga and the BoP may this time only fare as much Auckland. Gisborne could be the worst hit, with 100mm. Just be careful over the next few days but not frightened. Tie your boats up and on Monday night be ready to evacuate to higher ground if you need to – but I don’t think it’s going to be the worst storm ever to hit New Zealand
For many years cyclones were named after politicians’ wives, because they were considered temperamental and unpredictable. Womens Lib organisations howled in protest, and this ended in the 1970s. Now cyclones are equally named.
What these idiots don’t realise (or igore) is the further effect of more rain on top of the damage already done previously.
Recovery has scarcely begun.
This is the state of play right now. Crunchtime comes at high tide tomorrow night
