“WINDY" WELLINGTON

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 86, Issue 114, 18 May 1942, Page 3

“WINDY" WELLINGTON

SATURDAY’S RECORD GUST 92 MLLES AN HOUR AT RONGOTAI (P.A.) Wellington, May 17. Previous standards of windiness for Wellington were dealt a sore blow on Saturday afternoon, when a vigorous northerly made even standing dillicult at exposed points about the city, and excelled itself with a gust of 92 miles an hour at Rongotai. This is believed to be the strongest gust ever recorded in Wellington. The wind was part of a deep oppression which was moving in a westerly direction over the southern half of the North Island, and attained a maximum between 4.30 and 6.30 p.m. During those two hours the average wind velocity recorded at the meteorological office, Kelburn, vl’S between 40 and 45 miles an hour, with gusts touching 80 miles an hour. The peak was a gust, of 81 miles an hour at 6 p.m.. which is only eight miles an hour less than the Kelburn record. The 92 miles-an-hour gust at Rongotai. which occurred at 7.25 p.m., was four miles an hour better than that, station’s previous record. Material damage about the city was not extensive, considering the power of the wind’s onslaught. A plate-glass window in a shop in Bond Street was shattered suddenly at about 8.45 p.m., and windows and doors are reported to have been blown in in other parts of the city, but there was little damage of a costly nature. A woman who was blown over by the wind at Hataitai at 5.30 p.m. was taken to hospital with a cut face.