Here’s what is making the weather headlines today….

RAIN HITS THE FAR SOUTH TONIGHT

More rain on the way for the lower South Island this evening / overnight, some parts of Southland were a bit dry in terms of soil moisture but now the ground has been topped up, more rain is not necessary.

Most of New Zealand is looking pretty good in terms of soil moisture now but a fair chunk of the North Island is still waterlogged.

10 to 15mm is expected for Southland this evening and into Tuesday, perhaps some spots may hit towards 20mm.

As we can see by the precipitation percentage of normal map below, most regions can expect an average amount of rainfall over the next seven days. Just north of Auckland may be a touch drier than average.

Red shading below equals less rainfall the the statistical average for this time of year, white equals an average amount of rain, blue equals higher rainfall than average.

TEMPERATURE DROP ON TUESDAY

We mentioned last week about the temperature drop coming on Tuesday, this is still very much the case. The maps below show it all.

Christchurch for example, a high of 21 – 22 degrees today, a high of 14 – 15 degrees on Tuesday.

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SNOW FOR THE MAIN DIVIDE – TUESDAY

With the cold change moving through overnight and into Tuesday expect some snow to fall about the Southern Alps, perhaps as low as 400m for the ranges of Southland / Otago, 500 to 600m further north. While snow may fall to those mentioned levels any accumulations of note will be higher up, perhaps only a dusting will reach lower down.