Our last three-monthly predictions, and what actually happened.

What we predicted August to October 2010

What actually happened, August to October 2010

Interpreting these maps

The maps show our prediction of seasonal river flows made in August (left), and the outcome (right).

Full monthly and seasonal climate summaries are available from NIWA's National Climate Centre.

Note on mapped quantities

Percentage chance of:

Mapped quantities for last month and the last three months are based on the position of those flows in a distribution of historical flows from each flow recorder for that month or that season (where a season is any contiguous three month period). At present the data used to estimate the distribution are flow data from the beginning of each flow record up to the year 2000. If a catchment is mapped as ‘normal’ this means that the flows for the period were in the middle tercile (third) of the historic distribution. Catchments mapped as ‘far below’ or ‘far above’ normal mean that their flows for the period correspond to the bottom or top 10% of the historic distribution. Catchments mapped as ‘below’ or ‘above’ normal had their flows respectively in the bottom or top tercile but not in the most extreme 10% of historic flows.