Wintry weather for South Island as cold blast hits

Residents of Southland and Otago woke up to snow this morning after a night of freezing temperatures.

However, MetService cancelled all wind, rain and snow watches on Friday morning. The only ones that remain are the road snowfall warnings, mainly in the mountain roads.

Meanwhile, heavy rain and wind warnings for the upper North Island for Sunday and Monday have been issued.

Police have urged motorists particularly in North Otago between Oamaru and Palmerston to watch out for strong winds.

They said officers were called to Maheno-Herbert Road, near Happy Valley Road at about 1.15pm, after reports of a motorcyclist being blown off their bike.

They received minor injuries, said police.

Officers are warning motorists to drive to the conditions and especially for motorcyclists and high-sided vehicles to take care.

Meanwhile, snow has closed two highways, in Canterbury and Otago.

State Highway 7 Lewis Pass near Hanmer Springs has shut.

State Highway 87 between Kyeburn and Outram was is also closed, although Waka Kotahi says there is access for four wheel drive vehicles only.

Meteorologist John Law told Morning Report there was snow in parts of Southland and Otago, including Queenstown and the hills of Dunedin, down to 100 or 200 metres in some areas.

"It is going to be a cold feeling day for pretty much everyone across the South Island."

Temperatures fell to near freezing in some areas, including Tekapo, while Gore was below 1C on Thursday night, Law said.

Law said the cold weather could linger, but should clear up by early next week.

"I think we will find the temperatures start to pick up," he said.

"It's going to be a cool weekend but the good news is that I think we'll find the risk of snowfall starts to clear away."

Snow was expected to near sea level in Southland, Clutha, Dunedin, Central Otago and Queenstown Lakes, MetService said.

*If you have photos of the wintry weather in your area you can send them to RNZ at iwitness@radionz.co.nz

The forecaster issued road snowfall warnings for the South Island alpine passes, the Milford Road and Dunedin to Waitati Highway (SH1).

State Highway 94 was closed overnight between East Gate (Hollyford) and Donne River (Westgate) due to forecast snow.

The road was expected to open by mid-morning on Friday, depending on the extent of the overnight snowfall.

Clutha District Council said there was the odd snow flurry down to sea level and heavier accumulations on higher altitude roads.

People should drive to the conditions as there was a bit of snow on roads in the Dunrobin, Moa Flat and Waipori areas, it said.

'Bitterly cold outside and snowing heavily once again'

A farmer in Southland, Blair Drysdale, told Morning Report it was "bitterly cold outside and snowing heavily once again".

An inch (2.5cm) of snow had fallen and was starting to get quite heavy at about 7.30am, he said.

"Not ideal for this time of the year" but not unusual, he said.

"I was born on the 22 December and it was a white Christmas the same year apparently so it can happen pretty much any month of the year in Southland."

His wife in Stewart Island told him this morning there had been snow showers there too.

"We'll take it though, can't do much about it, it's nature and we've just got to get on with it."

Drysdale grows wheat, barley, oats, pea crops.

He said the autumn barley was quite fragile with the weight of the snow on it.

Southland dairy farmer Bruce Eade, who farms in Tapanui just north of Gore, said there was a couple of inches of snow on the ground and by the looks of the dark sky more was on the way.

Eade woke to a sprinkling of snow this morning but while milking his herd there were two large dumpings.

The snow had not caused any issues, he said.

"We run a wintering barn system here so we've got 250 cows in the big barn - they don't even know it's snowing apart from when they went to be milked and back to the shed and the other cows there have plenty of nice hedges and that on the farm so we picked strategic paddocks for them yesterday and last night and again today so I'm actually quite happy with how they've got through."

The power has flickered on and off a couple of times, he said, but there were generators for his milking shed.

Federated Farmers Southland provincial president Chris Dillon said the cold blast was arriving at a bad time.

"You do get a lot more damage to trees because all the leaves are out at this time of year, so you get a lot of branches breaking off," he said.

"That's probably the biggest risk at the moment because it can potentially knock the power out."

Culverden sheep farmer Graham Reed said the heavy winds could disorient the lambs.

"They aren't going to hear much, they're moving around a bit," he said. "It's quite hard for them all to keep connected"

The South and lower central North islands were hammered by high winds and heavy rain on Thursday.

Winds reached 140km/h in the region on Thursday morning. Strong wind warnings were also in place for Wairarapa and Wellington.

In North Canterbury, a truck overturned in high winds, and more than 2000 homes lost electricity. Power had been restored by Thursday evening. State Highway 1 north of Kaikōura reopened on Thursday evening.