Smoke from Victorian bushfires makes it across the Tasman Sea

Wednesday, 6 March 2019

Smoke from the Victorian bushfires is visible as billows high in the sky above Canterbury at sunrise on March 6, 2019.

Out-of-control bushfires burning across parts of Victoria have sent clouds of smoke across the Tasman Sea and high into the sky over parts of New Zealand.

In Canterbury, the Aussie smoke could clearly be seen as large white billows at high altitude to the east when viewed against the rising sun.

The Australian bushfire smoke can be seen in this MetService true-colour satellite image as a murky smudge extending from Banks Peninsula to the east, and also west of the country. This was taken at 8.20am on Wednesday

The sunrise was especially vivid and MetService said it might be worth keeping an eye on this evening's sunset.

MetService severe weather meteorologist Peter Little said the winds throughout the atmosphere above New Zealand had been westerly or northwesterly in recent days.

A vivid sunrise on Wednesday morning, taken from Worsleys Rd looking towards Sugarloaf.

* Heat wave fails to arrive**

'That's the perfect transporter across the Tasman for that smoke.'

The bushfire smoke could still be seen above Canterbury several hours after sunrise, turning the usually deep blue sky a milkier, paler blue.

'So it's not that beautiful blue shade we are used to in New Zealand. It looks more like a European or Asian sky, where there's more haze and pollution.'

It was difficult to estimate how high the smoke was, he said.

The murky area near Canterbury was possibly around 5km up while other patches, including two 'curious' streaks which showed up on the 8.20am satellite image, were closer to 10km.

It was likely most of the ash in the cloud had already fallen out before reaching New Zealand, Little said.

Bushfire smoke was not that unusual in our skies.