River Levels & Rainfall

The West Coast Regional Council collects rainfall and river data from sites throughout our region which is then transmitted via cellular, radio and satellite pathways to the Council’s computer database. We report this information alongside data collected from other sites managed by partner agencies.

Overview

Our interactive map provides an overview of rainfall and river level and flow on the West Coast.

Site icons: click on the site icons to access a brief summary of the data.

Data viewers

Summary tables: the Buller, Grey and Westland tabs each display a summary table of the rainfall and river sites in their respective district.
Chart: current and historical data is available for viewing for each site.
Data download: to obtain a copy of the data please contact hydrologydata@wcrc.govt.nz with details of your request.
For help using the data viewers and overview map please see our help page.

Use the dropdown menu to select a site, and the time slider, zoom tabs or custom data range viewer to navigate the data.

Data update frequency

Radio sites call in at 3 hourly intervals under normal conditions, though this frequency may be increased during weather events or when a site has gone through a stage alarm. At this time, Council staff will be closely monitoring the information transmitted by the recording station/s so may call in the data at shorter intervals.

Sites using the cellular or satellite network call in new data every 5 or 15 minutes under all conditions.

The website is continuously refreshed with new data once it arrives in the database.

For rainfall sites: ‘Last Sampled’ will only update if rainfall has been recorded. It is not necessarily an indication of monitoring site failure. Every effort is made to keep monitoring stations fully operational.

To all users of this data:

Please note:

The rainfall and river level and flow data on the website is ‘raw’. It has come straight from the Council’s automatic telemetry system and partner agencies, so has not been through a quality control process. It should therefore be treated as preliminary data and may be subject to change. Read our full legal notice here.
For more information or quality assured data please contact hydrologydata@wcrc.govt.nz with details of your request.

Related Information

Land Air Water Aotearoa (LAWA): for access to a range of West Coast environmental data including air, ground water, lake water and river quality, land cover, and water quantity.