Wellington turns whiffy when it's without its wild wind
Wednesday, 25 February 2026
If you were travelling through Ngauranga Gorge this morning you might have caught a whiff of something pungent. So we decided to re-up this 2023 story that explains what’s going on.
War, sang Edwin Starr in his 1970s protest anthem, what is it good for?
Wellingtonians may well have been asking a similar question of late albeit in reference to a considerably less profound topic - the city’s much commented windless autumn.
Wind, what is it good for?
For starters, it is so disconcerting when there’s no wind, most of us expect, if not Armageddon, then at least an earthquake or two. Eerie.
Read more:
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Stillness also brings not so perfumed air. Anyone who has noticed a particularly foul smell lingering in the vicinity of the Ngauranga Gorge-Wellington motorway over-ramp recently will be relieved to know it’s the lack of wind that’s been blamed for the pong.
The culprit wasn’t, as has been pondered, Taylor Preston’s meat processing plant – which has its own special aroma – but an air-release valve in the city’s sewer trunk main at the bottom of the Gorge.
According to Wellington City Council, the valve releases air from the pipe when it’s getting full of sewage. The resulting aroma is usually dissipated in the wind, that much maligned phenomenon that has been AWOL of late.
The area is also home to what’s delicately referred to as the Ngauranga Public Dump Station, an effluent disposal site used primarily by commercial stock trucks to dump animal waste and campervan owners, so another source of whiffy-ness on a still day.
Wind is also a pretty decent noise dampener. Residents in the outer ‘burbs often miss the annual cacophony of the gun salutes fired from Point Jerningham to mark various royal event because of Wellington’s renowned zephyrs.
2023 was, however, different. Social media was alight with pageant frenzy as the sound of 21 powerful bangs reverberated loudly around the hills above the city not once, but three times in the past six weeks – on May 7 for the King’s coronation, on June 4, when New Zealand observes the monarch’s birthday, and also on June 7 visiting Fijian Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka got a 19-gun salute. Talk about loud.
And let’s not forget all that nitrogen dioxide and carbon monoxide pumped out during morning and evening rush hours.
The city’s air quality is measured at a site in Willis St, near the corner of Vivian and Victoria Streets. Land Air and Water Aotearoa (LAWA) says the quality is generally good and meets national guidelines and standards because – wait for it – the site is exposed to winds which helps disperse traffic emissions, meaning they don't build up to unhealthy levels.
MetService meteorologist Ngaire Wotherspoon said the autumn months were usually the least windy in the capital, although not calm enough for Wellington to lose its windiest city crown.