High winds cause havoc

A swimmer leaps into stormy seas at Murray's Bay on Auckland's North Shore. Picture / Paul Estcourt

High winds and heavy rain caused havoc throughout Auckland and Coromandel regions today, uprooting trees and roofs and causing thousands of power outages.

At least 27,000 customers had their power cut today, and emergency services had to deal with road crashes, uprooted trees, flooding and boats ripped from their moorings.

"We've received over 250 emergency calls today, and almost all of them are weather-related," Fire Service northern communications shift manager Jaron Phillips told NZPA.

"We've coped with things so far but we've been stretched."

Mr Phillips said most of the emergency calls had come from the Auckland region, with the city's North Shore and western regions the hardest hit.

"We've had trees on fire after a lightning strike in Waimauku, northwest of the city, and in Whangaparaoa, north of Auckland, we had to call in the fire service high angle rescue team to haul up a couple of people caught at the bottom of a cliff."

Winds of up to 130km/h were reported in the Auckland area, and between 70mm and 180mm of rainfall was expected in Auckland, Northland, Coromandel and Bay of Plenty.

Police said there had been 88 vehicle accidents reported in the top half of the North Island. The most serious was on State Highway 1 at Waiwera Bridge, north of Auckland, where a truck hit a van.

Police communications manager Kevin Loughlin said the highway was totally blocked and police were arranging for heavy haulage so that the wreckage could be cleared from the scene.

Mr Loughlin said one person had been cut free from one of the vehicles involved, but his condition was not known.

Traffic is being diverted and SH1 is likely to be closed for several hours until the wreckage and scene examination has been completed.

"Motorists on the open road should exercise caution as we are dealing with numerous trees and power lines down," Inspector Kerry Watson of the police northern communications centre said.

Energy provider Vector, which supplies most of the Auckland region, had appointed extra staff to deal with expected bad weather but got more than they bargained for.

"We've had something like 15,000 customers without power, and it's got especially bad since about 3pm," spokeswoman Charlene White told NZPA.

The western and northern areas of Auckland were the worst hit, with outages reported in New Lynn, Henderson, Northcote and Bucklands Beach within the city, and Waiheke Island, Whitford, Wellsford, Warkworth, Helensville and Piha on the outskirts.

"Several experienced people think it's getting worse than the weather bomb we had in 2002," Ms White said.

She said Vector hoped to restore power to most homes tonight, though some individual faults and hot water issues may not be able to be attended to until tomorrow morning.

Powerco network operations manager said about 12,000 customers in the Coromandel, Thames Valley and Tauranga areas had their supply interrupted.

Power had been restored to about 9000 of them by 5pm.

"Gale force winds and heavy rains have caused hundreds of separate faults to Powerco's networks. This includes more than 25 separate major faults," Mr Dixon said.

He said the weather was expected to worsen from early evening through until the early hours of the morning.

"Our teams will continue working to repair the damage through the night, as long as it is safe for them to do so, and will resume work at first light, if necessary," he said.

"We expect that the restoration effort will need to be sustained through the day tomorrow as the poor weather is expected to continue."

Auckland Coastguard reported several boats had broken from their moorings, though no people were at risk.

" There have been a few adrift in Waitemata Harbour around the harbour bridge, which has been providing a lot of interest for passing motorists." a spokesman said.

Rodney District Council, north of the city, also reported that the outages meant some of its wastewater pump stations were unable to pump sewage, though these were expected to be running again early this evening.

Early tonight police said State Highway 2 through the Karangahake Gorge, between Thames and Waihi, was closed due to flooding.

Winds and heavy rain were expected to die down in Auckland this evening, but continued heavy rain was forecast in Coromandel through the evening and in Bay of Plenty through to Gisborne until tomorrow morning.

- NZPA