Weather Eye with John Maunder

Rainfalls for the month of July have been recorded in Tauranga since 1898, except for 1904, 1907, 1908, and 1909.

The graph shows the range of rainfalls from an extreme high of 348mm in 1951 to a low of only 2mm in 1902. The second wettest July was 1998 when 315mm was recorded, and the second driest July was in 1983 when only 22mm fell. The long-term average rainfall for Tauranga for July is 129mm.

The graph of the July rainfall shows ‘normal' variations from year to year. There is a very small decrease in the overall July rainfalls during the last 50 years (1961-2010) from an average of 127mm, compared with an average of 132mm during the 50 years from 1911-1960. This is similar to the months of January, February, April, May, and June during the same periods, which also show small decreases in the overall rainfalls during the last 100 years, compared with a small increase in the March rainfalls. Since 1898, there have been 12 July months with a rainfall of 200mm or more, but only two July months with rainfalls of 30mm or less. Interestingly, there have been two occasions in July when rainfalls of more that 200mm occurred in adjacent years (1979, 1978 and 2007, 2009).

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