Category Archives: New Zealand

Hardik Pandya. (Photo by Matt King/Getty Images)

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), on November 9, announced the squad for the upcoming three-match home series against New Zealand, which gets underway from November 17. It is learned that all-rounder Hardik Pandya has been excluded owing to fitness concerns.

Pandya has been struggling with a back injury, which has kept him away from his bowling duties for the majority of this year, which included his time at the Mumbai Indians during the 2021 IPL, followed by the T20 World Cup, where he bowled only in two fixtures out of five, with his inclusion and fitness under constant questioning throughout the tournament.

Meanwhile, on expected lines, the squad is sans numerous first-choice players who have been rested after a tedious, jam-packed schedule over the last year in bio-secure environments. The national selection committee named Rohit Sharma as the leader of the group, and KL Rahul as his deputy, following Virat Kohlis decision to step down from his position of Indias T20I skipper upon the conclusion of the 2021 T20 World Cup, where the teams campaign ended prematurely in the Super12s on November 8.

Kohli is one of the first-choice players to be rested alongside Ravindra Jadeja, Mohammed Shami and Jasprit Bumrah, while also absent from the 16-member party are Shardul Thakur, Rahul Chahar, Varun Chakravarthy, all of whom were included in Indias T20 World Cup squad.

The team will also welcome some new, uncapped members in Venkatesh Iyer, Harshal Patel and Avesh Khan, who all had an impressive run at the 2021 IPL, while Ruturaj Gaikwad, who made his debut earlier this year against Sri Lanka, has been included too. Gaikwad, notably, was the top run-scorer in the IPL this year, with 635 runs at 45.45, and a strike rate of 136.26, including a century and four half-centuries.

Iyer had an impressive stint with Kolkata Knight Riders as an opener, scoring 370 runs at 41.11 in 10 matches, while he also proved himself as a handy seam-bowling all-rounder. Royal Challengers Bangalore pacer Harshal ended the season with a chart-topping tally of 32 wickets (average 14.34, strike rate 10.56), followed Delhi Capitals Avesh, who finished as the second-leading wicket-taker 24 scalps (average 18.75, strike rate 15.25).

The series will also mark the return of Yuzvendra Chahal, who was surprisingly excluded from Indias T20 World Cup squad despite an impressive UAE leg of the IPL with RCB, while Shreyas Iyer and Deepak Chahar, who were the travelling reserves with the Indian team at the T20 World Cup, are back too, as are Axar Patel and Mohammed Siraj.

The fixtures will be played in Jaipur (November 17), Ranchi (November 19) and Kolkata (November 21), followed by two Tests in Kanpur (November 25-29) and Mumbai (December 3-7), the squad for which will be announced in the due course.

India squad for New Zealand T20Is: Rohit Sharma (c), KL Rahul (vc), Ruturaj Gaikwad, Shreyas Iyer, Suryakumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant (wk), Ishan Kishan (wk), Venkatesh Iyer, Yuzvendra Chahal, R Ashwin, Axar Patel, Avesh Khan, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Deepak Chahar, Harshal Patel, Mohammed Siraj

Go here to read the rest:

India vs New Zealand: Reason why Hardik Pandya isnt picked in T20I squad - CricTracker

Countries have gathered to negotiate the final details of a global bid to keep the planet under 1.5-2C of warming. Olivia Wannan reports from Glasgow.

A proposed rule under negotiation at the UN climate talks could force the Government to introduce tougher carbon-cutting measures at home, or risk not meeting its pledge under the Paris Agreement.

The pledge, to roughly halve emissions by the end of the decade, requires New Zealand to prevent 149 million tonnes of carbon dioxide from entering the atmosphere. Its planning to outsource up to 102m tonnes of this total, by purchasing carbon credits from other countries.

But a proposed rule in the carbon trading negotiations would limit the number of carbon credits a country can use to meet its Paris pledge. One expert says this would be a concern for New Zealand, though the rule has a limited chance of being passed.

READ MORE:* COP26: Could Brazil hold up climate talks for a third year in a row?* COP26: Is NZ on the wrong side of history in the fight over carbon credit cash?* COP26: This is the decade to reduce emissions

At the moment, the rulebook for the landmark Paris Agreement is still being debated at the 26th Conference of the Parties (or COP26) climate summit in Glasgow. Currently, it contains hundreds of different suggestions for rules that are still subject to debate.

One of these may be causing a particular headache for the New Zealand team: a potential rule to limit the number of international carbon credits a country can use to meet its Paris carbon-cutting pledge (known as a Nationally Determined Contribution or NDC).

Thats because New Zealand has long planned to use a high proportion of carbon credits to meet its NDC out to 2030.

ROBERT KITCHIN/Stuff

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Climate Change Minister James Shaw plan to cut domestic carbon by 47 million tonnes by 2030, a plan based on the final budgets suggested by the Climate Change Commission and released in June.

In 2015, then-Prime Minister John Key pledged to cut emissions 30 per cent by 2030. Late last month, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern increased this pledge to 41 per cent (by using different accounting, this also can be expressed as a 50 per cent emissions reduction). Keys plan relied on purchasing international carbon credits for up to 80 per cent of the target, with the remainder from domestic action. Under Arderns budgets, carbon credits from other countries will provide up to 68 per cent of the new goal.

The Paris Agreement, signed in 2015, allows countries to trade carbon. It set out a broad vision: direct trading between countries under bilateral or multilateral agreements, or via an international carbon marketplace.

But New Zealand set its NDC while the exact workings of these trades had not been decided. Two previous COPs have failed to produce a consensus agreement.

There are fears that carbon trades could undermine global efforts to reduce greenhouse gas that if managed poorly, the availability of carbon credits could even increase global emissions. This rule is intended to help address these concerns.

As well as affecting purchasing, the proposed rule would also limit the number of carbon credits a country can sell.

As it currently stands, the rule does not specify what the limit would be, but asks a UN advisory body to assess the need for a limit and choose a number. Its possible that the body would determine that a limit is not required.

Similar caps on carbon credits have been proposed in previous negotiations, but this wording is different to suggestions floated at previous talks.

Compass Climate consultant Christina Hood who has been involved with the carbon trading negotiations for a decade, even before the Paris Agreement said the rule, if passed, could affect New Zealands ability to meet its NDC. She thinks the Kiwi delegates will be keeping a close eye on on this section of the draft text.

However, Hood believes it is unlikely to become part of the final rulebook, if an agreement comes during COP26. Delegates arguing for hard limits face an uphill battle, she added.

There has been a long series of different types of limits to carbon market activities that have been discussed, she said. But those have all been shelved because those have been seen to be inconsistent with the way the Paris Agreement is actually structured.

In a statement, the New Zealand negotiating team said it was opposed to proposals that limit the use of carbon credits. Such a rule would stifle ambition, it added.

While every country is focused on reducing their own emissions and transitioning their economies, we can and need to deliver much more through cooperation, the team said.

To stay up-to-date with COP26, and broader climate topics, the Forever Project newsletter will give you a weekly update. Sign up here.

See original here:

COP26: Could New Zealand be forced to take more climate action? - Stuff.co.nz

Lydia Thompson in action for England

(Reuters)

England will attempt to complete a double over New Zealand when the two sides meet for the second time in as many weeks this Sunday. Simon Middletons side completed a spectacular seven-try rout of the world champions last week at Sandy Park, with Abbie Ward, Ellie Kildunne, Lark Davies, debutant Holly Aitchison, Abby Dow and Zoe Harrison all crossing the line in a 43-12 victory.

Weve got them next week as well. We cant get complacent. We need to look what we can do better for next week, Harrison told BBC Sport after the victory. Today we were really looking at ourselves. Even in the Six Nations weve been looking towards the World Cup.

Follow all the live action below.

The Black Ferns next head for France for two meetings with the second best team in the Northern Hempishere. It should be a useful gauge of where this New Zealand side actually are, surely stung by being so uncompetitive in back-to-back weeks, but with a grounding of Test rugby behind them.

Harry Latham-Coyle7 November 2021 16:53

Harry Latham-Coyle7 November 2021 16:39

Simon Middleton told The Independent before these two games with New Zealand that these encounters were as much about what the two sides learn about each other ahead of next years World Cup than the results themselves. You would think, then, that Middleton will be rather pleased with the learning that his side are simply in a different stratosphere to the reigning world champions on this evidence, utterly dominant across 160 minutes of largely one-sided rugby.

Eight tries this week and another performance of all-encompassing excellence from the Red Roses, and the Black Ferns have been dealt back-to-back record defeats.

Harry Latham-Coyle7 November 2021 16:39

(Getty Images)

Harry Latham-Coyle7 November 2021 16:36

Has Portia Woodman scored her second? She has!

A remarkable finish from Woodman, somehow surviving Sarah McKennas tackle and the efforts of an arriving Lydia Thompson to squeeze over. She had been set away by fellow Olympic gold medallist Stacey Fluhler, bursting through a rarely-sighted midfield chasm and producing a delicious lofted pass to put Woodman in space.

The conversion isnt there, and thatll do for an excellent afternoon for England.

Harry Latham-Coyle7 November 2021 16:35

No stopping Abby Dow this time! The ball slips free from Black Ferns hands inside the England half and Poppy Cleall is swiftly upon it, putting the ball in the hands of her faster teammate and asking her to set off for home.

A fierce fend, a speedy sprint, and Dow takes England beyond the half-century.

Zoe Harrison is again true from the tee - she hasnt looked like missing today.

Harry Latham-Coyle7 November 2021 16:33

New Zealand try mightily to find a fissure in the England defensive line and a third score but fail to do so, not aided by an untimely bang to scrum-half Bayler. Carla Hohepa is forced to rush a hacked kick and the Black Fern in front of her is offside as she collects the sliced effort. England penalty, and Sarah McKenna returns to restore them to 15.

Harry Latham-Coyle7 November 2021 16:30

Helena Rowland receives some treatment as we wait for a scrum, while Aurelie Groizeleau has wandered over to the big screen to check something. The crowd cheers as the French referee smiles as her own image is shown on the screen...

Ah, heres the footage! A stray trip from Lagi Tuima as she brought a Black Fern to ground and England will be penalised. Curiously, there is no card for Tuima despite the offence. New Zealand take the scrum, anyway, so the players will pack down again with Ariana Bayler, who has replaced Kendra Cocksedge, able to feed it.

Harry Latham-Coyle7 November 2021 16:28

More good attack from the Black Ferns, Stacey Fluhler with a lovely feinting inside-to-outside step, and Portia Woodman able to toss the ball inside as England, still without Sarah McKenna, of course, look short of players on the left.

But England just about get bodies across as Les Elder feeds infield and a stray pass is knocked on along the floor as Carla Hohepa cant quite get down low enough to catch the grass-trimmer.

Harry Latham-Coyle7 November 2021 16:25

Claudia MacDonald has replaced the excellent Leanne Infante at scrum-half and awaits service from her forwards, but England cant claim possession and New Zealand are able to attack, eventually gaining scrum feed inside the England half, which the two sets of eight will pack down for after Cheyelle Robins-Reti has received some treatment.

Harry Latham-Coyle7 November 2021 16:23

Originally posted here:

England vs New Zealand LIVE: Result, final score and reaction from womens rugby Test today - The Independent

WELLINGTON, New Zealand [AP] A New Zealand couple were weeding their garden when Colin Craig-Browns gardening tool hit something huge just beneath the soils surface.

As Colin and Donna Craig-Brown knelt down and began digging around the object, Colin wondered if it was some kind of strange fungal growth, a giant puffball, the AP reported. After Colin pried it out with his garden fork, he scratched away a bit of the skin and tasted it.

A potato.

We couldnt believe it, Donna said. It was just huge.

Donna describes the potato as more of an ugly, mutant look.

According to the Associated Press, it is quite possibly the biggest potato on record. When the couple lugged it into their garage and set it on their old set of scales, it weighed in at 17.4 pounds. Thats equal to a couple of sacks of regular potatoes or a small dog.

In the weeks since their unusual find on Aug. 30, the couples potato has become something of a celebrity around their small farm near Hamilton. The potato has been named Doug, after the way it was unearthed. Colin even built a small cart to tow Doug around, AP said.

We put a hat on him. We put him on Facebook, taking him for a walk, giving him some sunshine, Colin said. Its all a bit of fun. Its amazing what entertains people.

The couple said theyve applied to Guinness to have Doug recognized and are waiting to hear back.

Colin said there are no secret gardening tips they use. They usually throw a bunch of cow manure and straw onto their garden and see what happens. He said theyd been growing cucumbers in that area of their garden before the weeds took over and hadnt planted any potatoes. Doug must have been self-sown and quite possibly growing for a couple of years or more.

Its a mystery to me, Colin said. Its one of natures little pleasant surprises.

As the Craig-Browns showed the potato off, it began drying out, losing weight, and mold started growing from its wounds.

He was getting a bit pongy, said Colin, referring to the potatos smell.

So Colin cleaned up Doug as best he could and put the potato in the freezer, where it remains, the AP reported.

However, Colin may not be done with Doug yet. An amateur brewer, Colin said hes keen to turn Doug into a nice drop of potato vodka.

Here is the original post:

Doug the ugly New Zealand potato could be worlds biggest - NBC2 News

OPINION: In talking with Asian New Zealanders over the past 18 months, one of the fears expressed is that when borders start to reopen, an unconscious bias may mean Asian countries are some of the last New Zealanders are able to travel to.

Here at the Asia New Zealand Foundation, weve recently undertaken an exercise to see where we could travel in Asia. And it is a very complex jigsaw puzzle with few matching pieces.

Amid border controls, Covid apps, vaccination passports, airline requirements, transit conditions, testing regimes, quarantine and isolation requirements, it is simply too hard to get to Asia right now. (Pro tip: the APEC travel card looks like the most useful document to have at present.)

While some green lanes are opening up, theyre subject to bilateral agreements that New Zealand isnt yet part of.

READ MORE:* Fostering personal business links key to South Island's Asia trade * Our island nation's place in the newly-coined 'Indo-Pacific'* Interest in Asian culture and diversity will put New Zealand in good economic stead for the future

Some of us will have experienced travelling with yellow fever vaccination books in the past, but amid a climate of distrust, the WHO and other multilateral institutions face challenges in establishing international standards for Covid vaccination certificates.

IATA the International Air Transport Association is working on a system, with its travel pass still being trialled (including by Air New Zealand).

Its clear governments and airlines have work to do. Im sure progress is being made, but it is hard to see normal business travel to Asia happening anytime soon. Thats a problem, obviously, for New Zealand when you consider that most of our top 10 trading partners are in Asia.

And its even harder to see when young New Zealanders will be able to venture out into the world on their OEs again.

As I was grappling with the practicalities of getting a staff member to Asia, my sister sent me an old photo of me wandering down a Hong Kong alley as a nave, unencumbered and curious 21-year-old on my OE. It reminded me of the value of these experiences for young New Zealanders.

The OE is one of those great New Zealand traditions that has been, in my view, such a key part of New Zealands cultural trajectory for much of the last 100 years.

The opportunity to get out and see the world is one of the most rewarding and valuable experiences and helps build bridges between countries. Young New Zealanders have been lucky enough to benefit from an array of working holiday opportunities overseas, enabling them to be immersed in new cultures.

SUPPLIED

Simon Draper is the executive director of the Asia New Zealand Foundation Te Whtau Thono.

We all know that travel broadens ones perspectives on the world and can foster independence and self-reliance. Working holidays add something more they provide tangible skills that employers are looking for. They benefit not only the individual but New Zealand as a whole.

As executive director at the Asia New Zealand Foundation, perhaps my inclination to guide young graduates in the direction of Asia will seem an obvious one. But biases aside, there are few more marketable soft skills in todays work environment than an understanding of Asia and Asian cultures.

New Zealand has 10 reciprocal working holiday agreements in place with Asia, including Taiwan, Japan, Vietnam and Thailand, and other visa categories have also enabled our young people to live, work and study in the region.

In my last column, I wrote about how research the Asia New Zealand Foundation conducted recently showed how important personal connections are to the success of business relationships between New Zealand and Asia. It found that lack of language skills and market knowledge were the biggest challenges facing businesses looking to enter the region bigger than regulatory barriers.

To grow these critical Asia capabilities, each year the Foundation supports young graduates to undertake business internships in Asia. While this years cohort will be undertaking their paid internships online, we are looking forward to the day when our interns can once again experience life in Asian countries.

From conversations we have on their return, its clear these are transformational experiences that provide them with incredible insights, skills and knowledge.

Most New Zealanders will be familiar with the JET programme, which annually supports some 250 Kiwis to work in Japan, mostly as English teachers. Over the last 18 months, when the world has been largely cut off to New Zealanders, the Japanese-government-run programme has continued to operate and has been one of the few avenues, unless you are an Olympian, through which New Zealanders have been able to travel to Japan.

Teaching is, of course, just one, if perhaps the most popular, job young Kiwis turn their hands to in Asia. Increasingly, there have been opportunities to work in any number of fields and sectors.

While the advice of one generation to the next has a habit of falling on deaf ears, travel is not something that young Kiwis need too much encouragement to embrace. Its in our genes. Which brings us back to the challenge at hand, namely Covid.

At some point New Zealand will reopen to the world. We will again start inviting overseas visitors to these shores and start venturing out ourselves. Asia has to be part of the mix New Zealand will be all the poorer if it isnt.

Simon Draper is the executive director of the Asia New Zealand Foundation Te Whtau Thono

View post:

Why Asia must be invited when New Zealand reopens - Stuff.co.nz

There have been 113 new community cases reported in New Zealand today, after more than 200 were reported yesterday.

Photo: AFP

There was no media conference today. In a statement, the Ministry of Health said 78 of today's cases are yet to be linked, and there are 645 unlinked cases from the past 14 days.

It said 109 of today's cases were in Auckland, with three in Waikato and one in Northland.

There are 74 people in hospital, including five in intensive care. All are in Auckland and the average age is 51.

Today's figures are almost half the record 206 cases recorded yesterday.

There was also one new case detected at the border.

One of today's three cases in Waikato was reported yesterday but was confirmed after the cut off time, so is today officially being added to the case numbers.

The other two new cases confirmed in Waikato overnight are from Hamilton and torohanga. One was a known contact of previous cases and was already in isolation.

Both Covid-19 patients in Waikato Hospital yesterday have now been discharged.

The Ministry said the one new case in Northland is a contact of a case in Kaitaia and has been isolating at home. There have now been 18 cases in the region in the current outbreak.

There have now been 4352 cases in the current community outbreak and 7095 since the pandemic began.

There were 33,867 vaccine doses administered yesterday, including 7401 first doses and 26,466 second doses.

The Ministry said 89 percent of eligible New Zealanders have had their first dose and 78 percent are fully vaccinated.

Official testing sites can be found here.

Vaccination sites can be found here.

Continue reading here:

Covid-19 update: 113 new community cases in New Zealand today - RNZ

WELLINGTON, Nov 2 (Reuters) - Authorities planned to seal off the northern tip of New Zealand with police cordons on Tuesday, as they enforce a lockdown in the region over fears of an undetected community transmission of COVID-19 there.

Part of the Northland region, about 270 km (168 miles) from the biggest city of Auckland, is to begin a level 3 lockdown from midnight, said Chris Hipkins, the minister coordinating the response to coronavirus.

The move follows two cases in the region that lacked a link to any known cases.

"It's unclear how they could have possibly picked up the virus," Hipkins told a news conference. "There could be undetected community transmission in Northland right now."

The cabinet will review on Monday the decision to seal off the area, where vaccination rates are among the lowest in the country, with just 64% of North Island's eligible population fully vaccinated.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, who was visiting Northland on Tuesday, had to abruptly halt a media conference after being continuously interrupted and heckled by at least two people, who appeared to be anti-vaxxers.

One could be heard singing during the event, while another asked Ardern to identify a person who died in August after receiving the Pfizer vaccine, and accused her of lying to the public.

New Zealand won global praise last year for its response that stamped out the coronavirus.

But it has been tougher to quash the current outbreak of the Delta variant around Auckland, forcing authorities to decide to live with the virus rather than an earlier strategy of elimination.

Virus curbs in Auckland were extended by a week on Monday. read more

Reporting by Praveen Menon; Editing by Clarence Fernandez

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Read more from the original source:

New Zealand seals off northern region over suspected spread of COVID-19 - Reuters

From today, medically assisted dying is legal in Aotearoa but doctors are warning people may not be able to use it straight away.

Photo: 123RF

The End of Life Choice Act has come into effect one year after nearly two-thirds of New Zealanders voted in favour of it in a referendum.

The legislation was originally put forward by the Act leader David Seymour, and his deputy, Brooke van Velden, said its requirements will be strict.

"I'm just pleased that after decades of work from human rights campaigners up and down New Zealand people suffering terribly at the end of their lives will finally have choice, compassion and dignity in their last few days.

"We expect that at the beginning only a few people will ask to access assisted dying and only a few doctors will be willing to be part of the process.

"But like all laws, over time more people will know that this choice is available and more people will access it and more doctors will provide it," van Velden said.

To be able to ask for assisted dying, a person must have a terminal illness that is likely to end their life within six months, and must be competent to make an informed decision.

Dr Bryan Betty Photo: RNZ / Karen Brown

The medical director of the College of General Practitioners, Bryan Betty, said while assisted dying is now legal, patients wanting to undergo it may not be able to take advantage of the new legislation right away.

He said it will take time for the legislation to establish itself and one year is a short space of time in which to get everything in order.

"My concern is that patients may have expectations about the accessibility of end of life care or euthanasia at this point and how quickly it can be turned around.

"There's a very small amount of clinicians that are involved in it at this point so access to end of life may be an issue in the first few months as this rolls out."

A palliative care doctor who opposes euthanasia says robust information must be collected about why terminally ill people choose to end their lives under the new law.

Care Alliance deputy chair Sinead Donnelly said health officials should be asking people who meet the act's criteria whether they're choosing euthanasia because of pain, a lack of palliative care options or other reasons.

It needs to be asked "if people are choosing euthanasia because, for example, there's lack of access to palliative care for specific groups in specific regions," she said.

"We're very concerned about equity at the moment, and Mori and Pasifika, for example, are they choosing euthanasia? ... We need to identify if it is due to a lack of access to services."

Donnelly said failing to collect meaningful information could make it harder to recognise issues of access to healthcare.

Dr Betty said only about 60 clinicians are currently willing to help facilitate assisted dying.

"Look I think it's been a very short process to get this up and running - 12 months - so my expectation is it will be a bit of a slow burn I think as this unfolds over the next year or two until it becomes embedded in practice."

He said palliative care remains underfunded and under-resourced, creating an unlevel playing-field when it comes to assisted dying.

If more money and support went into palliative care, patients could make fully informed decisions.

Last month the government announced the appointment of three experts to monitor assisted dying.

They are: medical ethicist Dr Dana Wensley, nursing executive Brenda Close and palliative care consultant Dr Jane Grenville.

View post:

End of Life Choice Act takes effect in New Zealand - RNZ

From wind strong enough to toss two train carriages, to seven-storey waves ripping buoys out of the Southern Ocean, New Zealand's weather is wildly changeable. And as a new book shows, it's only going to get wilder.

Wellington once had a spell of seven scorching days, clocking in at 25 degrees C or more.

The Department of Health published a column in The Evening Post recommending tepid baths and eating tomatoes and oranges to keep cool.

But good luck finding anyone who remembers that sweltering stretch it happened in 1934.

Thats one of the fun facts in a new book by New Zealands MetService, New Zealands Wild Weather, which explores the history and science behind our worst weather.

Mark Gee

Heavy rain falling from cumulonimbus cloud over Lyall Bay in Wellington.

READ MORE:* Residents leave homes, state of emergency declared in Gisborne amid flooding and rising river levels* Super tides tear up concrete and damage homes on South Coast* On a hot streak: Warming climate a wake up call

A week of warmth hardly seems wild, but as MetService meteorologist and weather communicator, Lisa Murray, points out, it does illustrate why Kiwis are so obsessed with the weather.

The thing I love about the weather, is how much it changes and how interesting it is... Its very rare in New Zealand that youd have a week of the same weather.

Thats unless you live in Hamilton, which in 1978 had 32 days straight of 25C or warmer.

On an international scale, our weather is mostly middling, with a chance of extremes. We get tornadoes, but not as destructive as Americas; we get hail, but not as big as Indias cricket ball-sized smashers; we get droughts, but not as badly as Australias sunbaked earth.

Cameron Burnell/Stuff

The changeability of New Zealands weather is what makes it interesting for meteorologist Lisa Murray. (File photo)

A long, skinny landmass, our weather is shaped by the ocean swirling around us, the breath of Antarctica blowing north, cyclones spinning down from the tropics and the mountainous seams that stitch together the wet west and drought-prone east coasts.

We get all sorts in New Zealand, Murray says. As a forecaster, if you can forecast in New Zealand, you can forecast anywhere. Its that kind of challenging environment. We get big snow dumps, along with heavy rain events, really strong wind events, and we have such a different terrain.

And when wild weather hits, it hits hard.

CIVIL DEFENCE

The Waiho Bridge taken out by the flooded Waiho River, in March 2019.

We started crossing over and people were looking at us as if we were crazy. We got over the other side and I said: That doesnt look too good. We parked up in the middle of the road so people couldnt go past, and we saw bits of the bridge hanging off... It was pretty dramatic. Within 20 minutes it was all gone. DOC operations manager for South Westland, Wayne Costello, on crossing the Waiho Bridge just before it was taken out by flood waters , in March 2019.

In Murrays 15 years at MetService, standout wild weather includes ex-cyclones Gita and Fehi, which slammed into New Zealand within weeks of each other, in 2018. She was working to get road workers in before the mayhem, so they could manage any damage.

We have to be on our top game. So you have the adrenaline running through you constantly, because this is really important. These forecasts are life and death.

Kent Blechynden/Stuff

Severe weather forecaster Erick Brenstrum on the job in 2006.

Retired severe weather forecaster, Erick Brenstrum, spent 43 years in the job, starting in 1974. He remembers ex-tropical Cyclone Bola stalling over Gisborne and Hawkes Bay in 1988, dumping rain for three days and causing catastrophic flooding and landslides.

That was one of the most damaging storms to have battered New Zealand in the 20th century, alongside the 1968 storm that wrecked the Wahine ferry and an unnamed howler in 1936.

Cropp River on the West Coast holds the record for the heaviest 12 months of rainfall, at 18,413 millimetres, from October 29, 1997, to October 29, 1998.

Grant Gillingham, 5, admires the view while his dad Roger surveys the damage after floodwaters submerged a cottage on their Waerenga-o-kuri farm, south of Gisborne, during Cyclone Bola.

Theres a weird atmosphere in the forecasting room when a massive event hits both relief and regret at the forecast proving accurate, Brenstrum says.

There's that funny, sad mixture, that it's awful that the weather is doing damage and destruction, but how wonderful that, with the technology we have, we've been able to tell people that this is the place it was going to happen with a day or two's warning.

In his four decades as a forecaster, Brenstrum noticed temperatures creeping up. That means wetter weather is coming. Warmer air can carry more water vapour, but its worse than that. Imagine a pot boiling on the stove. Turning water to steam takes heat, so when that vapour is turned back to water droplets, in clouds, that heat is released. That increases the upward motions in the storm, which increases the rate of rainfall.

It doubles the effect, basically. So thats why, around the world, and in New Zealand, rainfall records are being broken.

Ryan Anderson/Stuff

A house in Papatoetoe was destroyed by a tornado in June.

Something picked me up and landed me 150 metres away in another paddock and totally wrecked the bike...The thing went through so fast I didnt have time to think. By the time I came to my senses it was gone, it took the hay shed with it and then disappeared. Took part of the roof off the farm cottage and left the young couple inside looking at the blue sky above them. Manukau Heads farmer Lawrie Coe, on being tossed by a tornado in September 1990.

However you slice the numbers, the capital is New Zealands windiest city. From 2011 to 2020, Wellington airport recorded the strongest gust (146kmh), the highest number of days with gusts of 90kmh or more (22) and the longest distance wind travels past a point during a day, called the wind run (602km).

It also holds the unofficial record for the countrys worst wind ever a 267kmh gust measured during the Wahine storm, at an uncertified site on Wellingtons South Coast.

The highest official reading was 250kmh, at Mt John in Canterbury, on April 18, 1970. Thats about as fast as a Porsche Cayenne at full throttle.

The nations biggest wind trap, however, is Fiordlands Puysegur Point, where lighthouse keepers apparently gave up farming sheep because they kept being blown onto the rocks below.

Angry air has claimed lives in New Zealand, including four children who died in 1880, when a mighty gust blew two train carriages off the Remutaka Incline north of Wellington, on an exposed stretch appropriately known as Siberia.

While New Zealand doesnt have tornadoes of the magnitude whipped up by Americas great plains, they can still be fatal. The worst happened in 1948, cutting a 180-metre swath of devastation through the Hamilton suburb of Frankton, killing three people, injuring 80 and damaging 150 houses.

Murray Clarkson

New Zealand gets about 47,000 lightning strikes on land every year.

I was enveloped by the brightest light I have ever seen I felt an instant of heat all over my body, similar to when you open up a very hot oven and get blasted by the hot air. Then the loudest explosive crack of thunder that literally vibrated my entire body. Fisheries officer Martin Williams, on being struck by lightning at Sponge Bay near Gisborne, in 2013.

The heat inside a lightning bolt is about 30,000C five times the temperature of the suns surface.

New Zealand gets about 47,000 strikes on land every year, but more than double that if you include our coastal waters. The South Islands west coast is the most frequently lightning-lit, but most strikes actually fire from cloud to cloud, rather than cloud to ground.

Supplied

The stages of thunderstorm formation. Stage 1 (left): the Cumulus stage is when warm, moist air rises forming cloud. Stage 2 (middle): the updraft strengthens and the cloud becomes a towering cumulus. When the updraft rises to the top of the troposphere, the top of the cloud freezes and spreads out into an anvil shape. This is the Mature stage. The cloud is now a cumulonimbus. A strong downdraft has formed with heavy rain, and moving air builds up electric charges, bringing thunder and lightning. Stage 3 (right): the Dissipating stage is when the downdraft dominates the updraft. The storm weakens, and the rain and electrical activity dissipate.

For a forecaster, thunderstorms are a bit of a nightmare. As New Zealands Wild Weather puts it, its like making popcorn. You know those kernels are going to burst, but you dont know in which order.

The accuracy of forecasting leapt ahead in Brenstrums 43 years. A few years before he started, someone in Christchurch would put the one daily satellite photo on a plane to Wellington airport, from where it would be sent in a taxi to the national office in Kelburn.

Temperature readings only came from land-based observation stations where weather balloons were sent up and you might get one ships observation a week from the ocean between Antarctica and Australia, where a lot of New Zealands weather comes from.

Now, high-resolution satellite images arrive at least every hour. Technology can estimate temperature anywhere, including over the ocean, and estimate wind strength from tiny waves on the sea surface.

Forecasters can even see inside thunderstorms. While theyre amazing creatures, with their ability to birth tornadoes, lightning and hail, thats about as close to them as Brenstrum cares to get.

Ive seen enough of what they can do that I really dont want to get anywhere near them.

While floods dominate the headlines, droughts generally hurt more. Between mid-2007 and mid-2017, droughts caused about $720 million of economic loss, compared with $120 million for flood damage.

Long dries and parched forests also make for fire weather and that will increase with a warming climate. High fire risk days are expected to double in some fire-prone areas.

New Zealands hottest day ever was February 7, 1973, when the North Canterbury town of Rangiora hit 42.4 C.

Barry Harcourt/Stuff

A heavy Southland snowfall making life difficult for new lambs. (File photo)

There was no sun, and any water on the roof would come down and form icicles right round the house. Anything steel like a waratah, if you tried to bend it, it would just snap off, thats how cold it was. It went on for four or five days; we were in a deepfreeze situation. I remember going to Omakau in the tractor for diesel and we ran into a warm wind which was actually blowing at about 2 C and we just thought it was summertime. Ophir farmer Sam Leask on the July 1995 freezing spell.

When Brenstrum was forecasting in Christchurch in about 1976, he opened the curtains to a world of white.

My heart leapt. Id grown up where it didnt snow and I was just overjoyed it snowed. It was a foot deep. Then after about 2 seconds of joy, my brain said That wasnt in the forecast yesterday... In terms of me experiencing weather that was not what I said it would be the day before, Ive never had a more dramatic example than that.

New Zealands coldest temperature was often cited as the -21.6C recorded in the Central Otago town of Ophir, on July 3, 1995. However, a forgotten record sheet revealed the chilliest day a bracing -25.6C actually occurred in Eweburn, Ranfurly, on July 17, 1903.

That unexpected Christchurch dump wasnt the biggest snow of Brenstrums career, though. That happened in Canterbury in 1992, when two storms hit within weeks, in July and August. More than a million lambs died.

While that was unusual in his time, incredible snows were not uncommon in the 1800s and early 1900s. One in 1895, with snow 1-2m deep in inland Canterbury and Otago, particularly stood out.

The real thing that made me fall off my chair when I read it, was this snow stayed on the ground continuously for more than four months, and that's just absolutely unheard of. To me, that's the mark of climate change, without a shadow of a doubt.

Although its been fun doing weather forecasting all these years, Im now almost crushed and appalled by the magnitude of the problem were facing with global warming... The world is staring down the barrel of really, really bad things, and we need action really fast.

New Zealands Wild Weather, by MetService (Penguin, RRP $45, Publishing 9 Nov)

Read more here:

Wet and wild the story of New Zealand's extreme weather - Stuff.co.nz

Billie Taylor/Stuff

A marble memorial near the East Coast town of Tikitiki commemorates soldiers who served from the district.

Most Kiwis have probably never heard of Tikitiki, nor could they imagine the impact World War I had on the tiny East Coast town.

The town about 145km from Gisborne once had a thriving population, counted in the thousands, but today it numbers only a few hundred.

Between 1914 and 1918, 435 men, many of them Mori, signed up to fight for King and Country, with 85 paying the ultimate price.

The story of St Marys Memorial Church and the Tikitiki memorial is just one of many highlighted in Billie Taylors book The Shape of Grief, 1914-1918.

READ MORE:* Letters from the trenches return to Passchendaele for a very personal Anzac tribute * Tom O'Connor: We should at least remember them* The Battle of Passchendaele: New Zealand's military's darkest day* Nelson College teacher remembered in World War I exhibition* War memorial recalls those who served

Billie Taylor/Stuff

The Rev Canon Matanuku Kaa rededicated the St Marys Memorial Church in Tikitiki earlier this year. The East Coast church serves as a memorial to Mori who served and died in World War I.

Taylor travelled the length and breadth of New Zealand to photograph and record the stories behind the memorials that pay tribute to those, who served in the war, from small town New Zealand.

Wherever possible, Taylor recorded how many served from each area and how many died.

The stats make for sobering reading. ptiki, with a population in 1916 of 1073, recorded 100 deaths.

Billie Taylor/Stuff

St Marys has an honours board recording the names of all Mori who served from the region.

In Waipukurau, with a population of 1167, 75 died from 66 families.

Such statistics, she says, tell the story of the human cost of the war, help explain the on-going grief associated with the war, and its impact on local economies.

The Tikitiki war memorial commemorates Mori men from the East Coast between Parit (south of Gisborne) and Tarakeha/Torere (east of ptiki) who served.

Billie Taylor/Stuff

The Horowhenua Pipe Band commemorates Anzac Day in Foxton, in 2015.

Tikitiki, she says, was typical of what happened throughout New Zealand and its memorial is a reminder of the often overlooked impact the war had on Mori.

Initiated by Ngti Porou leader Sir Apirana Ngata the memorial recorded the names of all East Coast Mori who died in the war. The foundation stone was laid on Anzac Day 1924.

Paramount chiefs from all over the North Island attended the 1926 consecration by the Bishop of Waipau, the right reverend William Walmsley.

Billie Taylor/Stuff

The 2nd Combat Service Support Battalion NZ Army on Anzac Day, at the Foxton memorial in 2105.

With up to 5000 people attending, including Cabinet Minister Sir Maui Pomare and Prime Minister Gordon Coates, it was one of the biggest gatherings ever held on the East Coast at that time.

Governor-General Sir Charles Fergusson acknowledged the East Coasts great loss during the war, and unveiled a marble memorial depicting a Mori soldier with rifle and lemon-squeezer hat.

The nearby St Marys Church has an honours board recording the names of all Mori who served from the region. Taylor notes that Ngata oversaw the preparation of the memorial component of the church.

Billie Taylor/Stuff

Author Billie Taylor travelled widely to record the impact of World War 1 on small town New Zealand.

Local women worked daily to complete complex tukutuku panels and school children helped with the many tasks, required to complete the project. Hone Ngatoto, a local tohunga whakiro, was responsible for much of the carving.

The Shape of Grief, 1914-1918 is available from writenow@xtra.co.nz

November 11 is Armistice Day, commemorating the end of World War 1 in 1918.

Visit link:

Small town New Zealand's contribution to World War 1 explored in new book - Stuff.co.nz