PAPANUI DROUGHT DECLARED OVER AFTER WOMAN FINDS DRIZZLE ON WINDSCREEN

At approximately 0714 hours Thursday, a Papanui resident located what she described as "actual water" on the windscreen of a Nissan Tiida in her driveway. This ended nine weeks of drought talk that nobody had declared but everybody had been on about.

The resident, Lorraine Basher, 58, reported the sighting to a neighbour. The neighbour put it on Facebook. This correspondent's mate at the station had already heard. "It was drizzle," Basher said. "Not dew. I know dew. This was coming down at an angle."

The suburb had spent most of February under a Christchurch City Council water notice asking residents to "conserve". The notice did not say whether that meant the garden or just the guilt. Basher's lawn is, in her words, "a bloody biscuit". She admits to watering the tomatoes after dark like a common offender.

By 0730 hours a second witness, Graeme Sutcliffe of Main North Road, reported moisture on the seat of a bicycle he had left outside overnight. This correspondent notes the bicycle has been leaned against the same bollard since roughly November and is not a measuring instrument. Nor is Sutcliffe.

MetService confirmed "trace precipitation" over the northern suburbs and said a nor'wester due Saturday would "sort that out by lunchtime". CCC said the water notice remained in effect and that eleven seconds of drizzle "does not constitute a change in the operating environment". This correspondent has forwarded that phrase to Margaret Henderson for her assessment.

Basher wiped the windscreen with her sleeve before anyone else could see it. The lawn is still brown. A man with a nose ring was observed photographing it. His reasons were not established and will be followed up.