Late winter storm to bring heavy rain and snow down south – Watch on TVNZ+<\/a><\/p>\n![\"Heavy](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/heavy-snow-is-expected-to-close-roads-in-inland-canterbury-a-UCUS3L4VMBHRNBJRIF37FOR6VQ.png\")
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Heavy snow is expected to close roads in inland Canterbury and Otago. (Source: Local Democracy Reporting)<\/p>\n
Heavy rain watches are also in place for parts of Buller, Grey, Canterbury, Otago and Fiordland, with further warnings possible.<\/p>\n
Heavy snow is expected to fall above 800m, with lesser amounts as low as 400m, prompting a heavy snow watch for the Canterbury High Country south of the Rangitata River and parts of Otago.<\/p>\n
MetService warned the snow could cause travel disruption and damage to trees and powerlines, while cold conditions could put stress on livestock.<\/p>\n
NZTA warned of significant travel disruption, with more than 30cm of snow possible on State Highways 8 and 80 in the Mackenzie Basin and South Canterbury, and up to 20cm on State Highway 73 above 700m.<\/p>\n
“Accumulations at this level are likely to impede travel and NZTA may close sections of highway or introduce restrictions to keep people safe and avoid vehicles becoming trapped,” an NZTA spokesperson said.<\/p>\n
Full list of weather warnings and watches<\/p>\n
Heavy Rain Warning – Orange<\/p>\n
Westland – 48 hours from 12pm Wednesday to 12pm Friday<\/p>\n
Heavy Rain Watch<\/p>\n
Grey and Buller south of Westport – 24 hours from 6pm Wednesday to 6pm Thursday<\/p>\n
Headwaters of the Canterbury lakes and rivers about and south of Arthur’s Pass – 5 hours from 1pm to 6pm Wednesday<\/p>\n
Otago Headwaters – 8 hours from 10am to 6pm Wednesday<\/p>\n
Fiordland north of Caswell Sound – 12 hours from 9am to 9pm Wednesday<\/p>\n
Heavy Snow Watch<\/p>\n
Canterbury High Country south of the Rangitata River and Otago north of Arrowtown to Ranfurly – 39 hours from 6pm Wednesday to 9am Friday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Warnings have been issued as a “significant winter storm” approaches the South Island, with up to 500mm of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":579664,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[158,1080,42,43,15488,40,38,41,39,3393,1241],"class_list":["post-579663","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-christchurch-canterbury","tag-dunedin-otago","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-southland","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-weather-news","tag-west-coast"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579663","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=579663"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579663\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/579664"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=579663"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=579663"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=579663"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}