Storm misery: Dismal weather sting in tail

The 11m Sardonyx yesterday washed up on rocks near Fisherman's Wharf at the northern end of the Auckland Harbour Bridge. Photo / Brett Phibbs

North Islanders face nearly a week of dismal weather, hampering the big clean-up after the weekend storm that cut power to thousands of residents, closed roads and caused widespread damage.

The news is even worse in Southland, where snow and wild weather are expected to force the closure today of many businesses and schools.

Weatherwatch said last night that strong to gale-force winds would continue to hammer many parts of the country - mostly south of Auckland - and conditions were likely to get worse before they got better.

"The large storm that has caused damage across the country will take another three or four days to fully move away," said head analyst Philip Duncan. "However, with the spring equinox arriving on Thursday, you can expect windy weather conditions to linger for the next four to six weeks."

Westerly gales are forecast to become severe in parts of Hawkes Bay and Wairarapa today, with gusts of up to 130km/h - strong enough to damage power lines and trees and make driving hazardous.

Motorists are also being urged to take extreme care when driving in the other parts of the North Island.

Highways in Waikato, Taranaki and Manawatu have been hit by slips and flooding, with some closed or covered by speed restrictions as crews clean up, the Transport Agency said.

State Highway 41 at Waihi Hill, between Turangi and Kuratau, was expected to reopen last night after a slip was cleared.

In Auckland at the weekend, trees were uprooted and some houses lost their roofs.

Yesterday, an 11m yacht, Sardonyx, was found semi-submerged and washed up on the rocks near the northern end of the Auckland Harbour Bridge. It could not be retrieved because of the rough weather.

Mark Davis of the harbourmaster's office said Auckland boat owners should check their moorings.

The home of an elderly couple was destroyed at Clarks Beach on the southern Manukau Harbour on Friday night after winds of up to 140km/h ripped through the area.

Clarks Beach Holiday Park owner Mark Richards said two 30m macrocarpa trees were up-rooted and had fallen into the tide.

At Manukau Heads lighthouse and signal station, Even McGregor reckoned the wind gusted to 130km/h. "But we've had worse here ... 230 km/h 12 years ago, which blew in all the windows in the house."

Power cuts

Electricity lines company Vector said yesterday that it had repaired up to 30 high-voltage lines in Auckland. It called in 100 extra staff to help restore power to 30,000 customers.

Power was restored late last night to about 200 homes in the northwest of Auckland, including Muriwai, Piha, Riverhead and Coatsville.

Vector spokesperson Helen Kerr said some homes north of the harbour bridge may still be without hot water due to pilot faults, but staff were working to resolve to fix them "as soon as they can".

"Our concern has been for people to keep treating all lines everywhere as live," said Vector group chief executive officer Simon McKenzie yesterday.

One of the last Vector problem areas yesterday was in Volcanic Rd, Balmoral, where wires were ripped apart when a 13m-high gum tree was blown down on to a power pole at 9.30pm on Friday. The tree fell across the road, missing the Misa family's home by a few metres.

"We heard a swoosh noise when it came down," said Slavenka Misa. "The wind was so loud we didn't hear the tree crack the power pole."

More than 100 Powerco staff were working last night to restore power to about 2000 households in North Island regions including the Bay of Plenty, Waikato, Taranaki, Wanganui, Rangitikei and Wairarapa, replacing broken poles, clearing trees from lines and repairing damage, network operations manager Phil Marsh said.

Power had been restored to 53,000 customers from Thames to the Wairarapa since the original storm struck and Mr Marsh expected the rest to be reconnected by last night.

In the Bay of Plenty, about 450 homes remained without power yesterday afternoon, causing anguish among farmers who have been forced to miss milkings because of the outages.

Powerco was sending in generators for cow sheds that were still disrupted.

Federated Farmers Bay of Plenty president John Scrimgeour said more than 4000 cows had been affected by outages on his road alone.

"I'm pretty annoyed about it, to be honest. There's an earthquake in Canterbury and they have every cow getting milked within 24 hours. We get wind and we can't get power back on."

Western Bay of Plenty district councillor Maureen Burgess said the storm, which knocked out power to her home at Paengaroa, continued to have fearsome gusts. "The wind was appalling. It still is. It's really horrible."

Antarctic blast in south

Weatherwatch said the South Island could expect more snow tomorrow and Wednesday "as our deep Southern Ocean storm sends up one last blast" from the Antarctic.

Mr Duncan said the cold air was coming from near the ice shelf and would keep temperatures to a high of just 2C inland and 7C to 8C in Invercargill and Dunedin.

MetService predicted more snow for Southland and Clutha from this evening.

A severe-weather warning has also been issued for Westland, where heavy rain was forecast across the Westland Ranges today, bringing quickly rising rivers and streams.

Meanwhile, Southlanders are hoping a brief break in snowfall today will give them a chance to clear sagging roofs before the wild weather starts again.

The region was hit hard by heavy snow at the weekend, causing the roofs of Stadium Southland's and Wren's paint shop to collapse, the roof of Windsor New World supermarket to partially collapse, and roofs of commercial buildings, including The Warehouse and Farmers department store, to sag.

"It doesn't look like we had snow overnight and some has definitely melted," Civil Defence spokeswoman Adrienne Henderson said today.

"Hopefully, we can melt some of it today and Tuesday before we get anymore, and then it may not be too much of an issue. We're just sitting and waiting and seeing at the moment."

Civil Defence decided against declaring a state of emergency yesterday, but warned schools and businesses to be cautious about re-opening today because of the risk of more roofs collapsing.

"We want them to consider the risk to the public before they decide to do that."

Aurora College, in Tokanui, Southland Community College and the Southern Institute of Technology, were among those who had decided not to open today.

People were warned against getting on to roofs and trying to push snow off.

"We don't want to fill up A and E with broken wrist and legs and things from falling off," Ms Henderson said.

"The other thing is for people to watch out for ice if they're driving or walking along footpaths."

Stadium Southland

Invercargill mayor Tim Shadbolt said yesterday the Invercargill City Council would be investigating why the roof of the $10 million Stadium Southland collapsed, saying there were concerns about its structural soundness since it was built 10 years ago.

A meeting was to be held today to discuss the stadium, which had been cleared for demolition.