ISSN 0111-1736 Meteorological Society Of New Zealand (Inc.) NEWSLETTER 92 MARCH 2003 Meteorological Society Of New Zealand (Inc.) NEWSLETTER 92 MARCH 2003 PO Box 6523, Te Aro, Wellington, New Zealand Deadline for input to next issue mid June 2003 Please forward contributions to Bob McDavitt, C/- PO Box 68429, Newton, Auckland or [email protected] CONTENTS Page President’s Comments 1 Branch reports 2 Notices 3 Conferences 4 NIWA seasonal summary for Spring 9 Notable recent weather (Trevor) 15 Christchurch weather (Ben) 22 Meteorology in the Press 23 Puzzle (Bob) 46 Your Committee (2002-2003) President Richard Turner [email protected] Immediate Past President Jim Renwick [email protected] Auckland VP Kim Dirks [email protected] Wellington VP vacant Christchurch VP Peyman Zawar-Reza [email protected] Dunedin VP Blair Fitzharris [email protected] Secretary Frank Drost [email protected] Treasurer Cliff Revell [email protected] Circulation Manager Andrew Tait [email protected] Journal Editor Howard Larsen [email protected] Newsletter Editor Bob McDavitt [email protected] General Committee Don Thompson, [email protected] Warren Gray. [email protected] Haibo Liu [email protected] Charles Pearson [email protected] The views and endorsements expressed in this newsletter are those of the contributors and advertisers, and not necessarily those of the Meteorological Society of New Zealand. The mention of specific companies or products does not imply that they are endorsed or recommended by the society. Meteorological Society of New Zealand Autumn 2003 Newsletter – page 1 President’s Note, Autumn 2003 Hullo, from a very busy week at the American Meteorological Society's 7th International Conference on Southern Hemisphere Meteorology and Oceanography being held at Te Papa. And what a wonderful week of weather the capital1 and the country have turned on for our overseas visitors. I think the conference can be judged a success in spite of the external factors such as the war in Iraq, SARS, terrorist threats, and Airline Bankruptcy's, which have conspired to keep the number of attendees down. The organizing committee (from which our own society contributed several members) deserve special thanks for their efforts in producing a rich, varied, and interesting program of talks and activities under these difficult circumstances, well done! Now, you may think I'm just spouting off the obligatory clichés when I say the conference was a success, but I am being most sincere. For me the measures of a conference's success are (a) did meeting with colleagues provide me (and hopefully them) ideas to test out? (b) was my enthusiasm for my research and meteorology renewed? (c) did I get useful feedback about my research? and (d) did I get to renew old acquaintances and meet new people, and (e) was it value for money? For me personally, the answer was yes to all of these. I'm not sure I can honestly say that about all the conferences I've ever been too. Other matters that I can bring to your attention are as follows. It seems likely, but cannot be confirmed at this stage, that our annual conference will be held in November in Christchurch. In 2004 our annual conference will be hosted by the Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society, it will be held in Brisbane in July, hopefully we will get a good contingent from NZ to cross the ditch. The Society's main committee has appointed a sub-committee to evaluate the future of our journal "Weather and Climate". Issues they will examine are (i) the structure of the editorial panel, (ii) the format of the Journal, and (iii) the target audience and aims of the Journal. If you have any thoughts you would like to contribute as to the future direction of Weather and Climate, send them to me and I can pass them on to the sub-committee. If you have thoughts on any other matters concerning the Society please also feel free to contact me. Richard Turner 1 - Warm, sunny, and light winds for about 14 days in a row! Fantastic! It's true what they say "You can't even beat Wellington with a stick on a good day". Now if we could just start to get some decent rain for the gardeners, the farmers, and the hydro lakes. Meteorological Society of New Zealand Autumn 2003 Newsletter – page 2 Regional Reports. Auckland – Kim Dirks On Sunday, March 23rd, World Met Day, the Auckland Branch held their annual BBQ, an opportunity to get together and discuss ideas for meetings for the year. Wairarapa Weather Watchers (Alex Neale) Wairarapa Weather Watchers held their first meeting for 2003 on Monday 24 February, attended by about twenty members. The evening's main topic was 'Phenology'. Some members had looked up the dictionary prior to the meeting, others came to be enlightened. Matters touched on included the fact that early numbers of the Royal Meteorological Society Quarterly (in the mid 1800s) often featured phenology; the influence of weather on migratory birds, and the weather's influence of garden pests, both insect and fungal. Current membership has reached 43 with the addition of a new member this meeting. Christchurch "Recent observations and modelling of the transport of pollution from Eurasia to North America" given by Dr Ian McKendry from the University of British Columbia on Thursday April 3. A talk is being planned in May by Dr Ha Pe Schmid from Indiana University. The topic and date will be confirmed soon. Ha Pe is a specialist on forest- atmosphere exchanges and has experience of sites in North America as well as the Amazon. Meteorological Society of New Zealand Autumn 2003 Newsletter – page 3 To members of Meteorological Society. John Lumsden as NZ's permanent representative to the WMO is seeking views and comments on documents that will be discussed at the XIV WMO congress in May. He would like any input from us to be back to him by April 25. I suggest that if you have any comments that you pass them back to me by the 20th of April and then I can compile the response into one coherent piece and then pass these on. The WMO documents can be downloaded from ftp://www.wmo.ch/Documents/sessions/Cg-XIV/English/. You then have a choice of a PDF or WORD subdirectory. Document 1-3(2) is the best to read for it gives a list of topics by number, an overview of the areas that will discussed at the Congress. I look forward to any feedback that can be provided. Sincerely Richard, President Meteorological Society of New Zealand (Inc) For those of you with Internet access – try out the latest NZ WEATHER FORUM at http://www.templeton.gen.nz/forum/ (click on NZ Weather for a list of the topics). Anyone can read the comments, but you will need to register if you wish to contribute. Some wonderful discussions are taking place. BUYS BALLOT MEDAL--CALL FOR NOMINATIONS Every ten years the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW) awards the Buys Ballot Medal. With this golden medal the Academy rewards outstanding contributions to the field of meteorology. In 2004 the Buys Ballot Medal will be awarded for the twelfth time. Selection of candidates will be based on nominations received from the scientific community throughout the world. These nominations will be considered by a Jury established by the Science Division of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. The Jury welcomes nominations postmarked before 1 June 2003. Candidates should be scientists whose achievements in the field of meteorology are outstanding and have been a source of inspiration to others. The award will be presented to an individual. The laureate of the twelfth Buys Ballot Medal will be invited to the Netherlands to receive the award in person. Specific information concerning the nominations:- institutions or individuals are invited to nominate candidates- self-nominations are not accepted- candidates should not be informed of their nominations- nominations should be submitted in writing, accompanied by material that will facilitate the Jury's evaluation, i.e. a curriculum vitae, a description of the work deserving recognition, a list of the candidate's publications, and one or two key publications of the candidate. To request Nomination forms, please email: [email protected] Nominations (air) mailed and postmarked before 1 June 2003 should be sent to: Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences Jury Buys Ballot Medal P.O. Box 191211000 GC, Amsterdam, The Netherlands Media Award 2002. A note from the judges for the TV weather presentation awards as summarised in the last newsletter: It has been pointed out that the judging panel's comments on individuals should be regarded as privileged information and should only be divulged when the appropriate personal permission has been granted. We ask all Society members to respect this point and NOT to spread these comments outside the Society unless they have written permission. Meteorological Society of New Zealand Autumn 2003 Newsletter – page 4 CONFERENCES The "6th International Symposium on Hydrological Applications of Weather Radar" will be held in Melbourne, February 1-4, 2004. Information about this conference can be found at: www.bom.gov.au/announcements/conferences/hawr2004 . For more information, contact [email protected] The next AMOS (Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society) annual conference is planned to be in Brisbane in 2004. The conference "theme" will be storms and the NZ Meteorological Society committee has accepted the invitation to be a co-host.