Tornado strikes near Hamilton, warning more could follow. / Supplied
A sharemilker watched in awe from his tractor as a giant tornado formed near Hamilton.
Sam Owen, who lives at Eureka, was heading west along State Highway 26 in his tractor when he spotted the strange cloud formation in the distance.
"I was really weird. I didn't really know whatit was until I got a photo of it just as it was reaching down and it just kind of pulled out and all of a sudden it started to suck out what looked like soil or dust into the atmosphere."
Sam Owen, who lives at Eureka, was heading west along State Highway 26 in his tractor when he spotted a strange cloud formation in the distance.
"You just don't expect to see one while driving down the road."
Wintec student Tawny Madison was driving home when she came across the twister on Holland Rd before pulling over and capturing a short video.
"I was just driving home from Wintec and saw it crossing Holland Rd. It was pretty shocking as I've never seen a tornado that close to home before."
View from Hall St, Hamilton, of the tornado. Photo / Luciano Fabretto
Dairy NZ Farm manager Ben Fisher was heading back to the office at the Vaile Rd farm to escape the rain when he spotted the tornado about 300 to 400 metres away.
Fisher said it looked about 50m wide at the bottom.
"At the bottom it was spinning quite slowly and then at the top it was really spinning quite fast. It was quite a bit narrower, but you could see it spin."
The dark clouds were moving really fast, he said.
He and another worker stood in the office observing it and said it lasted between 5 and 10 minutes.
"It was quite interesting. A bit unexpected for today."
Another tornado was seen forming over Tauranga Harbour.
A Tauranga twister forming over the harbour. Photo / Supplied
Tauranga man James Grafas and his 10-year-old son Isaiah were heading back home from Mount Maunganui this afternoon when he said they spotted a funnel-shaped mini-tornado.
Grafas said as they were driving home along Hewletts Road about 2.30pm his son spotted what they thought was a tornado forming over the Tauranga Harbour coming from the Mount Maunganui direction.
"It definitely didn't look like an ordinary dark cloud formation. I handed my cellphone to my son and he started to video it for me and we continued to watch it as I drove past the Tauranga Auto Village.
"It's been pretty crazy weather today as it was raining shortly before we saw the tornado but it was reasonably clear as we were driving along Hewletts Rd," he said.
Grafas said it did not last long and as they went past the Tauranga Bridge Marina there was a hailstorm which lasted for a couple of minutes.
As the tornado moved across the harbour towards them, Isaiah got "pretty excited", he said.
Lynette Hawkes was cycling back from the Waikato University gym with her husband when they turned the corner from Wairere Dr and spotted the tornado about 3 to 5 kilometres in front of them on Powells Rd.
"I thought how amazing is this that we've just come around a corner and there's a tornado there," the Fairview Downs resident said.
"When we first saw it you could see the dust and debris being swirled up above us in the air. It was very long and narrow so we scrambled to get our phones out to take photos so we missed the first bit and then took a sequence of photos.
"What was amazing really was it was over in about a minute."
Before they saw the tornado, the sky darkened and some large rain drops landed on them.
"It was quite eerie really. It was sunny, but there were these foreboding black clouds above us."
The twister was caught on camera. Photo / Sam Owen
WeatherWatch.co.nz says more isolated tornadoes are possible this afternoon in the upper North Island due to instability in the atmosphere, plus warmer than average weather.
There is also the risk of isolated thunderstorms.
"You just don't expect to see one while driving down the road."
"Downpours are likely to come on very quickly and end just as fast. Surface and flash flooding are both possible in localised areas," the forecaster said.
Fire and emergency northern shift manager Megan Ruru said they were not called to the incident.
A Marshmeadow Rd resident said she had never seen clouds move so fast. The tornado lasted five minutes and gradually got bigger, she said.
