{"id":120500,"date":"2025-11-06T05:17:07","date_gmt":"2025-11-06T05:17:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/120500\/"},"modified":"2025-11-06T05:17:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-06T05:17:07","slug":"cyclone-outlook-northern-new-zealand-faces-elevated-risk-this-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/120500\/","title":{"rendered":"Cyclone outlook: Northern New Zealand faces elevated risk this season"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cOnce over this threshold, the rate at which tropical cyclones can intensify generally increases with higher ocean temperatures,\u201d Domensino said. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">In some northern Australian regions, ocean temperatures have peaked at 31C, which is in the top 10% of historical records for this time of year. <\/p>\n<p><img  alt=\"ESNZ\u2019s principal scientist Chris Brandolino says New Zealand typically experiences about one ex-tropical cyclone a year.\" class=\"article-media__image responsively-lazy\" data-test-ui=\"article-media__image\"\/>ESNZ\u2019s principal scientist Chris Brandolino says New Zealand typically experiences about one ex-tropical cyclone a year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">ESNZ\u2019s principal scientist Chris Brandolino told the Herald the outlook for New Zealand was assembled with the warm ocean surface temperatures in mind. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cIn a nutshell, ocean temperatures, while very important, are not the only thing that influence how tropical cyclones of the season may go, if it\u2019s a busy season or a quiet season,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">Brandolino said the area they issue an outlook for is different from the area that Australia does. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cThere is a bit of overlap, but generally speaking it\u2019s a different area than what Australia monitors. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cOur outlook covers the Southwest Pacific, which basically goes from just south of Papua New Guinea, over what\u2019s called the Gulf of Carpentaria &#8230; and that goes all the way east to French Polynesia. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cIt is a big chunk of real estate,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">Brandolino said, on average, New Zealand experiences about one ex-tropical cyclone a year. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">New Zealand, and specifically northern New Zealand, are in the one to two ex-tropical cyclone range this season. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cThis year, that risk is considered normal to elevated,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n<p>Cyclone risk for Southwest Pacific Islands<\/p>\n<p><img  alt=\"A graphic showing the Earth Sciences New Zealand\/MetService assessment of the risk of cyclones hitting the Southwest Pacific basin from November 2025 to April 2026. Photo \/ ESNZ, MetService\" class=\"article-media__image responsively-lazy\" data-test-ui=\"article-media__image\"\/>A graphic showing the Earth Sciences New Zealand\/MetService assessment of the risk of cyclones hitting the Southwest Pacific basin from November 2025 to April 2026. Photo \/ ESNZ, MetService<\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">There are significant differences expected between the western and eastern halves of the basin from November to April.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cNormal to reduced risk is anticipated for the central part of the basin, and reduced risk is expected for the eastern part of the basin,\u201d ESNZ said. <\/p>\n<p><img  alt=\"A graphic showing the Earth Sciences New Zealand\/MetService assessment of the number of cyclones expected to hit the Southwest Pacific basin from November 2025 to April 2026. Photo \/ ESNZ, MetService\" class=\"article-media__image responsively-lazy\" data-test-ui=\"article-media__image\"\/>A graphic showing the Earth Sciences New Zealand\/MetService assessment of the number of cyclones expected to hit the Southwest Pacific basin from November 2025 to April 2026. Photo \/ ESNZ, MetService<\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">Northern New Zealand, Tonga, Wallis and Futuna, and the Solomon Islands are likely to see one to two cyclones during the season.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">Fiji is at risk of seeing two to three, while New Caledonia and Vanuatu are at risk of seeing three to four.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">\u201cBetween two and four severe tropical cyclones reaching category 3 or higher may occur anywhere across the region, so all communities should remain prepared,\u201d ESNZ said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">ESNZ, MetService, the University of Newcastle and meteorological services across the Pacific Islands created the report, with ESNZ thanking the other organisations for their contributions.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\">ESNZ was known as Niwa, the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, until July this year when it was merged with GNS Science to create the new organisation. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ZzQnbEvs\" style=\"display:none\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nzherald.co.nz\/nz\/the-daily-h-your-fast-smart-guide-to-the-days-biggest-headlines\/VQR5CULLQRECZP2ORSWPGDORBU\/?utm_source=nzherald&amp;utm_medium=article&amp;utm_id=nz_cta\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Sign up to The Daily H<\/a>, a free newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cOnce over this threshold, the rate at which tropical cyclones can intensify generally increases with higher ocean temperatures,\u201d&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":67325,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[2840,20919,84865,124,33959,63701,543,84864,6119,33443,42,117,43,7977,11599,17695,6274,7192,4514,6926,38666,1361,1961,1555,40,38,41,39,1352,80],"class_list":{"0":"post-120500","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-across","9":"tag-australians","10":"tag-bracing","11":"tag-could","12":"tag-cyclone","13":"tag-ditch","14":"tag-driven","15":"tag-elevated","16":"tag-faces","17":"tag-heading","18":"tag-headlines","19":"tag-new","20":"tag-news","21":"tag-northern","22":"tag-ocean","23":"tag-outlook","24":"tag-recordbreaking","25":"tag-risk","26":"tag-same","27":"tag-season","28":"tag-temperatures","29":"tag-that","30":"tag-this","31":"tag-threat","32":"tag-top-news","33":"tag-top-stories","34":"tag-topnews","35":"tag-topstories","36":"tag-volatile","37":"tag-zealand"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120500","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=120500"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120500\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67325"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=120500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=120500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=120500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}