Every now and then a weather map looks, well, beautiful. Last night (Thurday) there was a cool set up to look at as the air flow around the southern and eastern coastlines of Australia and out towards New Zealand drew a stunning picture that even Navigators would be proud of.

Thanks to the US Government (which allows their public weather models to be used here in New Zealand, unlike the New Zealand Government) we can display the current forecast wind maps (which are updated every 3 hours). This amazing data is then really brought to life by the amazing skills at Earth.nullschool.net (and freely shared globally, which we thank them for).

As you can see the current wind flow is sliding up the eastern side of Australia as a high forms further inland over Aussie and low pressure forms along the central Tasman Sea nearer to New Zealand.

You call that a route? THIS…is a route:
Not only do the winds slide south of Australia’s coast, but they then turn gracefully towards Adelaide, Melbourne and Hobart before then curving north eastwards then northwards perfectly around Australia’s eastern coastline past Sydney, Brisbane and even Cairns – from the Southern Ocean to tropical Queensland, hugging the coastline, before curving north westwards in the tropical north – fading into Papua New Guinea. 

Another striking thing about Thursday night’s image is how calm it is over New Zealand, then windy in the western Tasman Sea where the colder southerlies are – then calm again over inland Australia. However this isn’t too surprising considering New Zealand was calm with fog in the north today (then NE winds developing later) while Australia had a cold start with Sydney in the single digits this morning and Canberra feeling like -6C thanks to the southerly. We’ve been seeing this pattern for months now – one big high then one big low followed by another big high. It creates a turbulent mixture of calm and foggy, warm and wet, cold and windy, then frosty and calm – over and over. 

The southerly will reach New Zealand this weekend dropping temperatures. Some parts of southern New Zealand may only reach single digit highs later during the Long Weekend while Auckland, as an example of northern New Zealand, may only reach a high of 13 on Queen’s Birthday Monday.

Click to Animate, via Earth.nullschool.net

– Data with great thanks to the United States Government and US taxpayers.

– WeatherWatch.co.nz