A showery sou-west flow is about to kick in for New Zealand but before it does low pressure near the North Island will be clearing away first. The low is messy and continues to bring areas of heavy rain and drizzly stuff along the eastern side of the North Island in particular (mostly Hawke’s Bay, Wairarapa and Gisborne).

We have the latest on rain there and shows how it eases later on Thursday and clears on Friday. The colder change coming on Friday will go nationwide and bring some snow to the southern ranges and colder rain showers to many western and southern parts of the nation.

This new SW set-up lingers through the weekend and into next week too, bringing more surges of showers to the west (including as far north as Auckland and Northland).