Consistent rain kept August normally' soggy | Hawkes Bay News | Local News in Hawkes Bay

August may have seemed soggier than usual across Hawke's Bay but NIWA figures for the month show the region was the only part of the North Island to post "normal" rainfall.

Normal, but very consistent as while the month escaped the rain "bomb" deluges of June and July there were more grey, damp, drizzly and showery days.

One Dartmoor resident said it had been the wettest winter since she could remember - going back to the 1950s, while Norsewood resident Lyn McConchie said there had only been six days in the whole of August when it had not rained.

It was a winter best wrapped up as damp, but on the whole mild.

August especially so when stacked up against the opening months of June and July which arrived armed with early rain bombs. The Bay joined the West Coast of the South Island, Nelson and Marlborough as the only regions to post between 80 and 120 per cent of normal rainfall for the final month of winter - the rest of the country had up to double the usual August rain.

The month was at the mercy of lower than normal pressures over the Tasman Sea which meant more rain, more cloud and less sunshine than usual.

But it also meant more northerly winds over the North Island which led to slightly warmer temperatures.

Readings were between 0.5C and 1.2C above average across the country.

Sunshine was below average across the North Island - between 75 and 90 per cent of what August would normally receive.

Napier posted 21C on the first day of August. That balmy start to the final month of winter was a welcome tonic after a sodden July which saw the Bay join Gisborne as sites of above-average rainfall for the month.

However, the main reason for the above average figures was a huge southeasterly storm which spent three days hammering the eastern seaboard with wind and rain - causing extensive surface flooding and putting major strain on both city's pumping systems.

Yet while Napier and Hastings people cursed the deluge, Wairoa people were left wringing out everything in double the number in July - at 146.2mm they got twice what Hastings got for the month, and 54mm more than Napier.

The month of June though showed how fickle Mother Nature can be, with Wairoa escaping with the lowest rainfall, while Napier and Hastings were belted with 112mm of the wet stuff.

By June 3, just two days into the month, Napier had swallowed up 42.4mm of rain and Hastings 38.6mm.

By June 8 Napier had received 55.5mm of rain - more than Hastings would receive for the whole of August.

Winter rainfall figures kept by the Hawke's Bay Regional Council show the wide and varied spread of falls.

Yet at Crownthorpe, also on the Heretaunga Plains and just 20km away from Bridge Pa, 101.8mm of rain fell.

Raukawa resident Alison Greenwood has been keeping rain gauge readings since 2002 and since then there had been some startling variances. Like in August 2003 when 191.5mm fell - yet in 2005 she recorded just 20mm.

The August of 2010 saw 82.5mm fall on her Raukawa property - the second highest reading since 2002.

So the fields are green and the river levels are far from mere trickles, and urban lawns are still reluctant to take a mower without chewing up.

But now the spring is officially here and that is cause for optimism - yet it needs to be cautious optimism as NIWA is predicting normal to "above normal" rainfall for the Bay through the spring months.

As for the winter passed - the general consensus among weather-watchers was that "it wasn't too bad."