Winter 2025: Keep Your Inner Olympian In Check As Colder Weather Arrives
Colder temperatures are already being felt across the South Island, increasing the chance of weather conditions impacting the state highway network, explains Mark Pinner, NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA) System Manager.
While professional athletes are in training across the world ahead of the next Winter Olympics, to be held in Italy during early 2026, New Zealand drivers are being reminded not to race on the roads this winter.
Colder temperatures are already being felt across the South Island, increasing the chance of weather conditions impacting the state highway network, explains Mark Pinner, NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA) System Manager.
'Large parts of the state highway network across the central and lower South Island are at high elevations, which means they're the first to get frosts, snow or ice. While our contractors are constantly monitoring weather forecasts and patrolling the network, it'ss crucial that everyone plays their part. We saw snow on the Lindis Pass a few weeks ago, and we had a light snowfall around Burke's Pass and Tekapo this week.
'Inland areas across the region will also experience frosts and icy roads when temperatures drop in the winter months. By reducing your speed and increasing your following distance you will significantly reduce the likelihood of a crash occurring. Use your headlights to be seen and avoid sudden braking or turning to reduce the risk of losing control.'
NZTA, along with our maintenance contractors, works closely with MetService, who provide a specialised forecasting to predict and monitor road conditions. This includes a network of weather stations that provide critical data such as temperature, wind speed, rainfall, and road surface temperatures to inform both immediate responses and long-term planning.
Where possible, contractors will proactively apply grit or Calcium Magnesium Acetate (a de-icer) to reduce the impact of snow and ice. However, it pays for drivers to take extra care in winter, as conditions can change rapidly.
'When following a grit truck it's important to remember that the road ahead won't be gritted, and may well be slippery. Drivers should also watch out for shaded areas – these take longer to warm up and dry out, so could still be slippery even hours after the rest of the road is fine.
'At times roads may need to be closed, to keep both road users and roadworkers safe. We may look to close the road as poor conditions are coming in, to ensure that people don't get caught out. If you're travelling over the winter months it pays to be prepared – packing warm clothes, snacks and water will ensure you have provisions should the weather turn.'
Road users travelling across the country can find the latest information about the state highway network on the NZTA Journey Planner.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Scoop
12 hours ago
- Scoop
Ruapehu Networks Recovering From Overnight Storm
Ruapehu Civil Defence Controller Clive Manley says the district's local roads and water systems are recovering well following yesterday's extreme weather. 'The Emergency Operations Centre, which was activated as a precaution ahead of the storm, was stood down at 9.30pm last night,' said Mr Manley. 'While there were a number of slips and fallen trees that closed local roads - including Raetihi-Pipiriki Road at Mangaeturoa North Road, Tokirima Road at the Ohura River bridge by Maraekowhai Station, and Roto and Saddlers Roads - our contractors have been working since first light to clear the debris. Most affected roads are expected to reopen by mid-morning, although Raetihi-Pipiriki Road has sustained a major slip and will take longer to clear.' Ohura Road was reduced to one lane about 5km from Ohura township, and there has been some shallow flooding near Waitangata Road close to Matiere. High turbidity levels caused by heavy rainfall, along with increased water demand during the school holidays, put pressure on drinking water supplies. 'Taumarunui, Ohura, and Owhango water treatment plants were taken offline during periods of peak turbidity,' said Mr Manley. 'However, water treatment operations are now returning to normal. The Waimarino (National Park), Ohakune, and Raetihi plants continued operating throughout the event without any issues.' Mr Manley added that the district's wastewater systems were put under pressure due to the large volumes of water entering the system, but these are expected to stabilise as water flows subside. As of 10.30am this morning, Waka Kotahi NZTA reported that State Highways 43, 3 and 4 remain blocked at various points due to slips and were advising people to avoid unnecessary travel. 'If you do need to travel out of the district, please use the NZTA Journey Planner at to check the latest highway conditions.' With the ground still saturated and local roads likely to be fragile, drivers should take extra care, reduce speed, and watch out for surface flooding.' Ruapehu Mayor Weston Kirton said that he wanted to thank those involved in the emergency response. 'I want to acknowledge the outstanding efforts of council contractors and emergency services who worked overnight and are now busy supporting the recovery. I would also like to thank the Pipiriki Campground for stepping up and looking after a family who became stranded due to the road closure. It's a great example of the community showing manaakitanga and caring for others,' he said. Anyone encountering flooding, slips, or other road hazards is urged to call Council on 07 895 8188 or report the issue through the Antenno app.
Scoop
14 hours ago
- Scoop
NPDC Crews Assessing Damage And Keeping Watch As Rain Continues
NPDC crews are out and about assessing and cleaning up damage following yesterday's deluge which has caused widespread flooding across the district, impacting roads, parks and wastewater networks. We continue to monitor the situation with more rain forecasted today and overnight and we advise people to keep up to date with the latest weather conditions on through MetService and NZTA Journey Planner for state highways. We will update our website ( and Facebook page as more information comes to hand. General Take care if you're out and about on the roads. There have been several sewer overflows – please keep of floodwaters due to risk of contamination. Take care if on the road and drive to the conditions or avoid unnecessary travel. Our team are on the ground assessing and cleaning up We will continue monitor the situation throughout the day. You can find the latest weather forecast from MetService, state highway updates from NZTA or check out Taranaki Emergency Civil Defence for regional updates Council facilities impacted yesterday. We are still assessing and will update on these as more information comes to hand. Puke Ariki Library and Museum – is open. Huatoki Plaza – still closed. Brooklands Zoo – is open today. ROADS Surfacing Flooding – open unless stated otherwise. Carrington Road – Extensive surfacing flooding along most of the road. Oxford Road Norfolk Rd Hurford Rd - Stockman/Tikorangi Rd east Albert Rd. 154 Windsor Rd 12 Pentland Pl 425 Bedford Rd North Lower Durham Rd Lower Dudley Rd Hursthouse Rd Slips Reported -open unless otherwise stated 415 Barrett Road Mill Road 42 Govett Ave 22 Frankley Rd, Slip Okoki Rd- Two slips blocking the road just past Kaka and Okoki Rd intersection. St Aubyn St – Mohakatino Rd –closed Uruit Rd – Small slip at tunnel. Carrington Rd partially blocking one lane around 12km mark. Tupoki Rd- Underslip/tommo being assessed Waitaanga Rd, Closed, Okau Rd, Okau Rd, Closed Matapo Rd, slip partially blocking. Sewer overflows: Waitara: Wastewater will be pumped through the marine outfall from about 8:30am on Friday to ease the pressure on the Waitara pump station. Waitara: An overflow was reported in Jackson Street early Friday. Inglewood: the oxidation ponds, which started overflowing on Thursday, are still overflowing. New Plymouth: an overflow was reported near the Boat Shed in Pukekura Park early on Friday. Please stay out of floodwaters because of the risk of sewage contamination. STATE HIGHWAYS SH43 CLOSED (between Whangamona and Taumaranui – although non-essential travel along the entire route is not advised) SH45 CLOSED at Manaia at the intersection with Inaha Road SH3 Awakino Gorge CLOSED between Oha Street and Papakauri Road SH4 Whanganui to Raetihi CLOSED Crews are monitoring all sites for further damage. NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi is aware of potholes forming on the state highway network around Taranaki, as a result of the heavy rainfall. Crews are continuing to assess damage.
RNZ News
4 days ago
- RNZ News
Can US Customs legally search your phone and what can you do about it?
Photo: RNZ Explainer - We carry our entire lives on our phones these days, but that also can make you particularly vulnerable when travelling to another country. When visiting America, US Customs have the right to search your devices - as do many other countries. After the return of Donald Trump to the presidency this year, there have been increased reports of travellers to the US denied entry and some detained in custody by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). New Zealand has recently updated its advice to those travelling to the US to highlight the risks and what travellers may face, including inspection of your laptops, phones and tablets. Is this legal, and is there anything you can do to protect your security? Here's what you need to know. They sure can. It is laid out clearly on the US Customs and Border Protection website . Sophia Cope is a senior staff attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation in San Francisco, a nonprofit organisation that defends civil liberties. She said Customs have a wide remit to conduct inspections. "Customs and Border Protection (CBP) asserts broad authority to search travellers' devices at ports of entry (like international airports), even devices of American citizens," she said. US Customs claims the searches help fight crime before it enters the country. The CBP defines "devices" to be: "Any device that may contain information in an electronic or digital form, such as computers, tablets, disks, drives, tapes, mobile phones and other communication devices, cameras, music and other media players." "These device searches are unconstitutional," the Electronic Frontier Foundation writes on its website, calling searches "exceptionally intrusive" . The Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution protects people from unreasonable searches and seizures by the government, but border agents have been found to have wide exceptions under legal doctrine. Non-US citizens do not necessarily have all of the same guaranteed constitutional rights that American citizens do. The US government claims that in 2024, less than 0.01 percent of arriving international travellers had their devices searched. However, there has been a strong surge in immigration crackdowns since Trump returned to the White House. Trump issued an executive order in January calling to "vet and screen to the maximum degree possible all aliens who intend to be admitted, enter, or are already inside the United States". Customs has the right to vet and screen visitors entering the US. Photo: AFP / Getty Images North America If you're a non-citizen trying to enter the US, refusal to comply with a device search may result in being denied entry, Cope said. "American citizens have the most leverage to refuse to comply because they must be let back into the country," Cope said. "However, they can be detained for several hours, subjected to additional questioning, and their devices can be confiscated for days, weeks, or months." US green card holders should also be let back in the country, but that has sometimes changed in recent months, she said. "We've seen the current administration display a willingness to challenge green card status, and so these travellers should take that into consideration." Donald Trump's administration has tightened border security. Photo: AFP "These searches have been used to identify and combat terrorist activity, child pornography, drug smuggling, human smuggling, bulk cash smuggling, human trafficking, export control violations, intellectual property rights violations and visa fraud, among other violations," the CBP website states . CBP also says searches can be used to see what a visitor's "intentions" are in coming to the US: "Furthermore, border searches of electronic devices are often integral to determining an individual's intentions upon entry to the United States and thus provide additional information relevant to admissibility of foreign nationals under US immigration laws." The CBP says it can retain copies of information obtained from a border search if it contains evidence of violation of law, or more broadly, "if the information relates to immigration, customs, or other enforcement matters." Data that is retained is kept in the CBP's systems, which it says have "robust access controls limiting user access to only those with a need to know". CBP should not access data stored in cloud services, Cope said. "CBP's 2018 policy expressly prohibits officers from looking at live cloud content on devices seized at the border/airports/other ports of entry. Border agents must put a device in airplane mode or otherwise disconnect it from the internet." The EFF has put together an extensive digital privacy guide for travellers , she said. The Foreign Affairs Ministry updated its travel advice to New Zealanders in May, including warnings about possible detention at the border . The US is under guidance for travellers to "exercise increased caution" on the government's Safe Travel website . A spokesperson for MFAT said that as of late June, 16 New Zealanders had requested assistance with immigration difficulties in the US since January. "This is made up of issues at the border and also in the community. It doesn't mean these people were detained," MFAT said. MFAT's Safe Travel website warns that on arrival to the US, "your travel documents, reasons for travel, or belongings (including electronic devices) may be subject to scrutiny and inspection". There have been multiple reports of people visiting the US having trouble at the border over political speech. Australian Alistair Kitchen was detained and questioned about views on Israel and Palestine before being deported from LA to Melbourne. He told RNZ's Jesse Mulligan that his name was called over a loudspeaker before he was even through the Customs queue. "I was pulled into the back room and my phone was demanded and my passcode was demanded and I realised at that moment that this wasn't random or ad hoc but they had been waiting for me, and they told me as much. Australian writer Alistair Kitchen. Photo: Supplied "They said, the reason you're here is because of these posts you wrote online about the protests at Colombia (University) ... and I had taken those posts down days before I got on the plane." The Department of Homeland Security has denied Kitchen was deported over his political views. "The individual in question was denied entry because he gave false information on his ESTA application regarding drug use," it said in a statement, although Kitchen maintains he was first singled out for screening over his political posts. Social media can leave plenty of traces even if they are not on your phone. "Social media apps can contain cached or copied content that is on the device's hard drive, even though the original content is principally stored on the social media company's servers," Cope said. "Thus, when a device is in airplane mode, some of that content may be viewable on the device, even if it's otherwise private. As such, people can delete those apps for the purpose of travel and reinstall them later to avoid border agents accessing cached private social media content." A New Zealand telecommunications expert who asked not to be named told RNZ that "I suspect if you've been online telling everyone what you think about Donald, it's too late" even if you delete information from your phone. The expert said that the information is out there and seen by companies such as Peter Thiel-founded mass surveillance technology company Palantir. "If apps are deleted on a phone but an officer knows ahead of time about a traveller's social media, the lack of the apps on the phone might lead to more scrutiny and questioning," Cope said. "I had prepared," Kitchen said. "You go through the passport control and you do make sure that your social media has been cleaned up, that your phone is missing messages that might have been critical of Donald Trump, for example. ...In my case, it was not sufficient exactly because they had already done this background search on me." US Immigration Customs and Enforcement teams - ICE - have been cracking down on illegal immigration. Photo: US ICE Many other countries can also search your phone at Customs. In New Zealand, Customs has had the power since 1996 to examine all goods crossing the border, including devices. However, Customs said "officers must have 'reasonable suspicion' of criminal offending before searching an electronic device and must have "reasonable cause to believe" that an electronic device has offending material on it before detaining it". If you refuse access, courts can impose a penalty of up to NZ$5000 - but this is only possible if Customs decides to prosecute the traveller. Customs claims on its website that most passengers entering New Zealand do not have their devices searched. The advice from some tech experts is to make a plan before travelling if you're concerned about data on your phone - but it might not be a good idea to buy a pristine cheap "burner" phone for a trip. "We've heard anecdotally that travelling with a temporary device or an otherwise "clean" device devoid of any personal information can itself raise suspicions with border officers," Cope said. "At the same time, travellers may have very sensitive information on their devices, especially if you're someone with ethical or legal obligations for confidentiality such as a journalist, attorney, or doctor. "But even average people may have personal photos or texts or emails that reveal sensitive or intimate things about themselves or their families that they wouldn't want a US federal agent to see. "People should therefore think about what privacy interests they have and mitigate their risks - both of a privacy invasion and of being denied entry or escalating an interaction with a CBP officer - to the extent they feel comfortable." Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
