VIDEO: Tornados rumble through the Bay

The wet weather which lashed the Bay of Plenty last night brought more than rain, thunder and lightning to the region, with a number of mini tornados spotted near Apata and Aongetete.

One reader reported seeing over six twisters out towards Tauranga Harbour and the Wainui Estuary, while another was captured near Walkers Road East towards Katikati.


This tornado, and many more like it, were spotted near Apata and elsewhere last night.

One reader who contacted SunLive said: 'Going on our time stamps, the first tornado we noticed touch the ground went by the house at 6.30pm.

'It wasn't intense, but had a large footprint of about 100 metres and was picking up dust and leaves and bending grass and trees over.

'Between then and 8.30pm we saw at least six more, but they didn't track up beside the house.

'There was the odd lightning strike in the distance, but the rain didn't follow it. The wind was continually changing direction as they formed, so it was quite eerie to feel it and watch the clouds start to swirl before the funnels formed.”

MetService meteorologist John Law says it was an active weather system overnight.

'It looks like a lot of the rain fell in the hour from 10pm to 11pm,” says John. 'We had around 18mm of rainfall overnight, which is a fair bit to come through.

'But a lot of it was in that one hour.

'The band then moved eastwards across the Bay of Plenty. Te Teko had about 43mm of rain last night.” John says it was an intense band that moved through which has now cleared and made room for clearer skies.

'For the rest of the day, we are set to see some more showers develop and some could be fairly heavy with a chance of a rumble of thunder, but more likely inland.”

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