Those swirling lines and triangular symbols on a weather map are a language. Once you can read it, a single chart tells …
Sharing your station’s data to networks like Weather Underground and the Ambient network is free, easy, and turns your h…
Measuring air temperature accurately is far harder than it looks, and most home stations get it wrong for one avoidable …
Fog is simply a cloud at ground level, but the different ways it forms explain why some mornings are socked in and other…
A heat dome can lock a region into days of dangerous, record-breaking heat. The mechanism behind it is a particular trap…
La Niña reshuffles weather patterns across the globe in broadly predictable ways. Here’s what the pattern is, and the ki…
Nuku'alofa, the capital of Tonga, sits on the northern coast of the low coral island of Tongatapu in the South Pacific at approximately -21.14°S, 175.20°W. It has a tropical climate (Köppen Aw/Af) — warm and humid year-round, cooled by the southeast trade winds — with a warm wet season and a cooler dry season, and it lies in the cyclone belt.
The warm, wet season, from November to April — the austral summer — is hot and humid, with highs around 29–30°C and warm nights. This is when the heaviest rain falls, in frequent downpours and thunderstorms, and it coincides with the South Pacific cyclone season, when tropical cyclones can strike the low islands with destructive winds and storm surge.
The cooler, drier season, from May to October — the austral winter — brings mild temperatures, with highs around 25–26°C and comfortable nights near 18–19°C, cooled by the steady southeast trade winds. Rain is much reduced and humidity lower; this bright, breezy stretch is comfortably the best time of year.
Nuku'alofa receives on the order of 1,700–1,800 mm of rain a year, with rain in every month and a wet-season peak from December to April, while the winter months are markedly drier. Live rainfall, humidity, and pressure readings for the city are shown in the panels above.
Nuku'alofa sits low on a coral island in the heart of the South Pacific cyclone belt, and tropical cyclones between November and April are its gravest hazard — Cyclone Gita devastated the capital in 2018. Its low elevation also leaves Tonga acutely exposed to storm surge and rising seas.
To follow any single measurement in Nuku'alofa more closely, use our live instruments: the online barometer for atmospheric pressure, the thermometer for temperature, the hygrometer for humidity, the anemometer for wind speed, the wind vane for wind direction, and the rain gauge for rainfall.