Wild weather ahead for weekend

Heavy rain and flooding is on the forecast for the weekend, as another round of wild weather settles in over the country from tomorrow.

MetService said a low moving in from the Tasman sea meant that places that have already experienced a lot of unsettled weather were likely to be exposed to more over the next few days.

Meteorologist Daniel Corbett said those areas stood a real risk of flooding.

"The impending wet weather will put the dampener on weekend plans and more importantly, further heavy rain on saturated ground could pose a flooding risk across parts of New Zealand".

He said the active trough would spread a band of rain and strong northeast winds over the far north of the North Island on Saturday and a Severe Weather Warning for heavy rain had been issued for parts of Northland.

"Anyone in Wellington has a dry day on Saturday, and most likely anyone below Hamilton will. The heavy rain on Saturday will hit Northland, Auckland and as far south as Hamilton by Saturday evening.

"It will spread all through the country right down to Dunedin by Sunday evening," Corbett said.

On Sunday, the band of heavy, persistent rain was expected to slide down over the rest of the North Island to reach northern and eastern parts of the South Island.

Weather Watches, which are one step down from Weather Warnings, have also been issued for Auckland, Coromandel, the Bay of Plenty and Waikato, Rotorua, Gisborne, Marlborough, Nelson, Canterbury and Otago.

Corbett said where it could get "critical", was in those places that had already had a lot of rain.

He said the wet weather was likely to persist over the next several days "so there is the likelihood that the forecast and the risk area could change, so it will be important to keep up to date with the latest forecasts and warnings".

- © Fairfax NZ News