Metservice Discussion

So I have been talking with William Nepe who is a meteorologist at MetService. He has sent me this article which sums up Wellington's windiness - it's an article written by a group of wind surfers who wanted to look at exactly how windy Wellington is. This is the basic summary from the article:

• Wellington is located in a River of Wind - a wind corridor between the South Island and the North Island.

• Wellington is the windiest main centre in New Zealand with a mean annual wind speed of 22 km/h.

• Wellington also has an average of 22 days per year with mean wind speeds over 63 km/h (40 knots).

• Wellington averages 173 days a year with wind gusts greater than about 60 km/h or 32 knots.

• October is generally the windiest month of the year with a mean of 27 days with wind speeds over 15 knots, 19 of those days are over 20 knots.

• North is by far the most common wind direction, blowing from this direction (0 degrees) a massive 37.6% of the time.

• Wellington is one of the windiest cities in the world (possibly the windiest) and is windier than other southern windy cities including Cape Town, Perth, and Geraldton.

• The strongest wind speeds where recorded at Hawkins Hill of 248km/h (134 knots) on the 6 November 1959 and 4 July 1962.

If you would like to read the full article click here.

There is also some graphs and visuals included in the article.