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 for the period 1898-2011 shows the range of rainfalls from an extreme high of 348mm in 1951, to a low of only 2mm in 1902.

The graph shows 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.

However, the last two July months have had relatively extreme rainfalls with 328mm in 2012 (the second wettest on record) and 61mm in 2013, which was the fifteenth driest July on record.

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.

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 than 200mm occurred in adjacent years (1979, 1978 and 2007, 2009).

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