By LIBBY MIDDLEBROOK
Like a stroppy child sent to bed for bad behaviour, the freak La Nina weather pattern made her parting shot count.
Tearing winds and thick belts of rain swept through the northern half of the North Island yesterday thanks to the subtropical pattern, which is renowned for its cyclones and extreme storms.
A National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research scientist, Dr Jim Salinger, said the weather pattern had faded during the past few months as the climate shifted to more balanced weather.
"After two years of La Nina this might be the last we see of her for a while," he said.
The tiny Northland town of Awanui was worst hit in a storm that brought down power lines, caused sewage overflows and sparked heavy-rain warnings for the Coromandel Peninsula and north of Orewa last night.
Flooding forced authorities to evacuate four Awanui homes yesterday and many other local home owners surrounded their properties with sandbags to avoid water damage.
A fire truck spent hours pumping water off one low-lying property in Awanui, which received a whopping 128mm of rain between midnight and 9 am yesterday. Awanui is 8km north of Kaitaia.
"We've had an enormous problem getting the water out of the houses," said Kaitaia's deputy chief fire officer, Peter Sullivan.
"Awanui's such a flat area and because the tide's coming in, the water's got anywhere to go."
In other areas of Northland, three schools shut and several country roads were closed because of surface flooding.
Motorists escaped relatively unscathed from the rain and gales, which gusted up to 100 km/h in exposed areas of Auckland. About 60 Whangaparaoa Fullers Ferry passengers wound up on a bus to Auckland as high seas forced the company to cancel its early-morning service.
Wellington ferry services were not affected.
Around 350 Auckland central city Vector customers may also have been disrupted by the nasty weather after losing their power supplies for around two hours yesterday afternoon.
Meanwhile, MetService weather ambassador Bob McDavitt said the bad weather would largely clear by the weekend, although another low from the north was likely to hit the Coromandel with torrential rain.
North Island skifield operators were hoping for some more overnight luck after the rain skipped Mt Ruapehu on Tuesday night, sparing the new snow.
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