{"id":17116,"date":"2026-04-09T05:57:31","date_gmt":"2026-04-08T17:57:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/?p=17116"},"modified":"2026-04-09T05:57:31","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T17:57:31","slug":"experts-await-latest-weather-models-to-get-clearer-picture-of-cyclone-vaianus-path","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/?p=17116","title":{"rendered":"Experts await latest weather models to get clearer picture of Cyclone Vaianu’s path"},"content":{"rendered":"

MetService staff will be casting their eyes over the latest weather models on Thursday to try to get a clearer picture of\u00a0what path Cyclone Vaianu could carve<\/a>.<\/p>\n

At the moment it was too soon to say, with the various models still showing different tracks.<\/p>\n

The information MetService did have so far was enough for it to put the entire North Island under a strong wind watch for Sunday.<\/p>\n

“I believe this is the first time that we have done this,” forecaster Brian Mercer told RNZ.<\/p>\n

“And that is just to reflect the fact that this is a very significant storm.”<\/p>\n

Mercer said although different tracks were being shown in modelling, it was very likely somewhere in the North Island would get\u00a0strong winds and heavy rain<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The watches in place now were to give people a heads-up for risk throughout the entire island, he said.<\/p>\n

“Model runs come in two or three times a day depending on which model it is, and as we get a little bit closer we’re going to be looking at those and we will certainly be or very likely be issuing warnings, very likely orange warnings and potential red warnings,” Mercer said.<\/p>\n

“However, those are discussions that we have to have as we see the progress of the cyclone and as we have discussions with Civil Defence and local authorities in the relevant areas.”<\/p>\n

The uncertainty meant it was also too early to say when the existing warnings would be upgraded.<\/p>\n

“So people need to prepare, they need to make certain that the gutters are clear, they need to make certain that, for example, trampolines and so on are not in a situation where they could fly away, they need to do all the normal things they do when there is a storm approaching,” Mercer said.<\/p>\n

“And it is a very high impact event, and so we have taken this step of actually issuing this initial phase earlier than we normally would and for a larger area.”<\/p>\n

rnz<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MetService staff will be casting their eyes over the latest weather models on Thursday to try to get a clearer picture of\u00a0what path Cyclone Vaianu could carve. At the moment it was too soon to say, with the various models still showing different tracks. The information MetService did have so far was enough for it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":17117,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[222,174],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latest-news","category-nz-news"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17116"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17116\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17118,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17116\/revisions\/17118"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/17117"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}