A Te Araroa whānau with young children were trapped on their roof for hours in the dark with only torches and no wet weather gear as flood water and debris rushed below.
Damage across Tairāwhiti Gisborne from the intense bout of weather in the past 24 hours is being assessed as rain warnings lifted this morning.
The worst of the storm hit the northern parts of the region, including Te Araroa, where seven people trapped overnight on a roof were rescued by Fire and Emergency New Zealand and are being evacuated by helicopter for medical assessment.
Fire and Emergency first received the call at 2.35am, but could not safely access the property for several hours, central shift manager Alison Munn told the NZ Herald.
Maree Brownlie, the owner of the Twilight Coffee Garden in Te Araroa, said the whānau trapped on their roof included small children.
“They were up there in that howling gale and rain clinging to their roof all night. They never had any wet weather gear, they just had some torches fortunately.
“Their house this morning is just completely surrounded by debris.”
Brownlie said the camping ground opposite that property had “basically been annihilated”.
She understood the whānau were staying with family now.
She said “boulders”, “huge pine trees” and debris had left local roads and the highway impassable.
“There are just slips everywhere along the highway, blocking basically every few houses; it is impossible to get there.
“We’ve had complete road dropouts by the bridge just on the other side of the hill, so the road to Gisborne is out completely.
”We’re screwed because the Waioweka road is out, and now this route around the coast is out. A lot of people are really cut off, badly cut off."
Much of the township had been devastated in the stormy weather.
“Homes are surrounded by debris and flooding up to the windows,” Brownlie said.
”I just feel so fortunate a slip came down behind my house and turned left right at my back gate.
She said the slips along the road were “not just a bit of debris” and would require large earthmoving equipment to shift.
Some were still sliding.
“That is the problem, some of these are still actually active.”
She said a lot of small businesses along the East Coast through to Ōpōtiki would feel the impact of the weather event, particularly as its aftermath coincided with the Auckland Anniversary weekend.
“This is the season that a lot of coast businesses really need to get them through the quiet winter, so that is going to be a downer for everyone with businesses along here.”
The Te Araroa-based Kai Kart Takeaways & Cafe is staying open today after heavy rain devastated the township.
Employee Michael Martin said a lot of locals were getting around on horses and four-wheel drive vehicles to help out where they could and get debris off the roads.
“Myself and my bosses decided we are going to open for five, six hours today, just so road workers, locals and stuff, if they are hungry and don’t have food they can come in to eat,” he said.
“While the Kai Kart is doing that, across the road the Four Square is helping out Civil Defence with food packages and stuff like that.”
He said the road from the town centre to Hicks Bay had been flooded and Waione Rd had been “covered in big rocks, dirt, mud, everything”.
“It is hard at the moment, but everyone in the community seems to be focusing and trying to help out all of the people who need it.”
Martin’s own home on Waione Rd was mostly fine through the heavy rain overnight.
“There is a little bit of flooding, but that was only because our drains get blocked quite quickly. So basically our grass, our footpath, walkways and stuff like that, they flood, but the house is still intact, so not any flooding inside the house.
“There have been a couple of trees that fell over in front of our house and driveway. If we had left one of our vehicles there, it definitely would have been broken down.
“It is actually quite surprising how bad it got. Now, after all of our rain, we’ve got bright sunny skies and hot weather.”
An urgent evacuation took place at Punaruku around 3am.
Hicks Bay was flooded, and the nearby bay of Onepoto was cut off. A slip on the hill above Hicks Bay was pushing water through the motel, and clients were moved into the restaurant for safety.
The Hikuwai River peaked at about 10m overnight, with rainfall around 20mm an hour at its height, Ūawa Tologa Bay Civil Defence area manager Greg Shelton said.
About 15 families either self-evacuated or were moved to relatives’ homes from Tolaga Bay last night.
Shelton told Newstalk ZB that everyone was moved by nightfall and no one needed to be housed at the local emergency centre.
As of 7.30am today, there were no reports of homes being inundated, although Civil Defence is continuing to assess the damage.
The area received just over 100mm of rain overnight.
State Highway 35 between Okitu and Tolaga Bay reopened at 9.40am, while the road remained closed from Tolaga Bay north to Pōtaka as crews continued to assess damage from slips, flooding and debris.
Back in urban Gisborne, it was “eerily quiet” on the Taruheru River overnight, according to Tairāwhiti Civil Defence.
Two people from a Harris St residence were taken to the House of Breakthrough Welfare Centre.
The Gisborne District Council opened emergency wastewater valves at the Wainui and Oak St pump stations at 1.20am to prevent wastewater from overflowing back into people’s homes, and on to roads, causing a significant health risk.
“The team did as much as possible to avoid it, but the network was inundated six times its normal capacity with rainwater from widespread surface flooding and the intense rainfall,” a post on Facebook read.
“The discharge affects city rivers and Waikanae beach. Contact with these waterways is likely to pose a risk to health.
“We are notifying Hauora Tairāwhiti Medical Officer of Health and the water users and sports groups.”
Residents were advised against swimming, fishing, or gathering shellfish in affected rivers and directly adjacent beaches for at least five days after the valves are closed.
Gisborne Mayor Rehette Stoltz said there was a choice between having sewage on residential property or “we do this”.
“It’s not what we want to do, but when we see rain like this, no system can accommodate this.”
A local state of emergency was declared at 5pm on Wednesday after MetService issued a red rain warning for Gisborne north of Tolaga Bay and an orange warning for the rest of the region.
Stoltz said the decision to lift the rain warnings was very good news.
“We can see the rain easing, also up the coast,“ she said. “There is extensive damage up the coast.”
Stoltz asked the public to inform the council or Tairāwhiti Emergency Management about any damage to infrastructure that needed to be checked.
“Let us know. We need people to be our ears and eyes on the ground. We can’t be everywhere.”
Stoltz said there was “a massive piece of SH35 missing close to Te Araroa”.
There were slips on SH2, which NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi (NZTA was “comfortable” about being able to clean up soon.
Some local forestry roads, like Tauwhareparae Rd, have been closed overnight.
Stoltz said city bridges were inspected at 2am, with staff looking for woody debris.
“It was all okay. For us, the tidy up begins.”
Stoltz said “a few people” evacuated from low-lying areas in the city to the House of Breakthrough church.
Several marae also took evacuees.
“I’m just so extremely proud of how our coast whānau opened marae and were proactive.”
Stoltz said civil defence was doing a great job and had had a lot of practice.
Planning had started two days ago.
“We had meetings on Tuesday morning and afternoon, yesterday, every few hours.
“We are well prepared and well connected with the communities.”
Stoltz said communities needed “a big shout out” for being responsive when asked to evacuate or reach out to neighbours.
The council said the weather system was “passing through” with rain clearing from noon across the entire region.
“River levels will either be peaking or will have just peaked and starting to fall through the morning and return to safer levels in the afternoon.”
The Hikuwai River rose rapidly, and although not as high as earlier forecast, it still reached significant levels.
“Rainfall was particularly intense on the north of the East Cape, and the rest of the region experienced sustained heavy rainfall.”
Rainfall south of Tokomaru Bay came in slightly under forecast.