Minister admits tsunami reaction not good enough

Congestion at a lookout near Gisborne after the early morning Tsunami warning. Picture / Gisborne Herald

The Minister for Civil Defence has admitted the official response to this morning's tsunami warning was not up to scratch.

Rick Barker has ordered the head of Civil Defence to step up the way it communicates with the media when alerts are issued.

A tsunami warning for New Zealand, Fiji and other countries was issued by the US after an earthquake measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale struck off Tonga at 3.26am this morning.

The alert was lifted a couple of hours later, but not before international media had reported the possibility of evacuations in New Zealand.

Any tsunami was originally predicted to hit Gisborne at 6.21am this morning but people only heard about the risk from early morning media reports or relatives calling from overseas who had seen the news on international media.

Residents and local officials on the east coast of the North Island have expressed their anger at the official handling of the alert.

George Wood mayor of North Shore in Auckland joined the criticism of the response this afternoon, describing the communication by Civil Defence as "appalling".

He only found out about the alert from a radio report at 6.20am. "I then contacted my Civil Defence officer and he told me he had been advised about an hour before, but frankly, he was told about it far too late if the tsunami was going to arrive here at 6.20 this morning."

He said the situation had been "confusing" and there did not appear to be clear procedures for advising people.

Angela Reade, civil defence manager at Napier City Council, said it was 5.20am before she heard from the Ministry of Civil Defence in Wellington.

"The tsunami happened at 3.26am but we didn't know about it until 5.20am, so we will be taking this up with the ministry," she said.

Mike Adye, group manager at the Hawke's Bay Regional Council, added: "It could have been organised more efficiently at a national level, and it's been a wake-up call for us all.

"A lot of people had concerns after they heard about it through the media."

Gisborne mayor Meng Foon was only alerted to the tsunami threat at 4am by a CNN report.

"I happened to be up and flicked on the TV and there it was," he said. "So I phoned our Civil Defence person to tell him to keep an eye on the news.

"One thing that was a bit scary was people did not seem to know who to contact or where to get information."

The council in Gisborne was holding a debriefing session with Civil Defence and other emergency services this morning, Mr Foon said.

Civil Defence national controller Mike O'Leary has defended the reaction, saying the National Crisis Management Centre was activated but that within half an hour of the quake it was obvious no national warning would be necessary.

However, he admitted: "We probably need to fine-tune some of our responses."

Mr O'Leary said New Zealand received between 10 and 20 alerts a year. Agreements were currently being made with Radio New Zealand and the Radio Broadcasters Association over broadcasting warnings, and a public education campaign was planned.

National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (Niwa) physical oceanographer Dr Roy Walters said the location of the quake meant a tsunami would never have hit New Zealand.

"A warning doesn't really mean something is coming, it just means something has happened and we should keep our eyes open," he said.

There are no reports of damage caused by the earthquake in Tonga, but officials said they were checking outer islands in the group, particularly the low-lying Hapai Islands, which were near the epicentre.

Mele Lopez, an nzherald.co.nz reader, said family had been trying to contact her father who is currently in Tonga all morning but phonelines were down.

When contact was finally made he told her it was a "very huge earthquake".

She added: "I asked him if any buildings fell and he said no. Nobody was hurt either. But he wants to come back home. The electricity is also still out."

- NEWSTALK ZB, NZPA, HAWKE'S BAY TODAY, REUTERS, HERALD ONLINE STAFF