Tīnui locals share a beer after a community meeting at the hall on Sunday, after Cyclone Gabrielle. Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
Families cut off for days in the hardest hit part of Wairarapa after Cyclone Gabrielle have been flown out by chopper.
It was for a few hours only, so they could be at a community meeting on Sunday, to discuss getting the Tīnui area back on its feet.
But then they flew back home with bags of kai and encouragement.
Hamish Taylor and his family had not been able to get out from their farm since the cyclone, as they could not get around a massive slip on the road. But they made it to the hui.
Silt covered paddocks outside Tīnui, near Wairarapa's east coast. Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
An abandoned mud covered car outside Tīnui shows how high the Whareama River got, near Wairarapa's east coast. Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
"So we had to get choppered in today, from Mark Shelton, he came and picked us up, along with our neighbours," Taylor said, standing in the brilliant sunshine, outside the community hall.
"So he had three trips in."
Shelton said he gave his passengers their first glimpse from the air of the damage to their farms.
"Just 10 minutes, fly around, show them around the backs of the properties, the more extensive ones.
"Quite surprising how well received that's been. Really appreciated."
Floodwaters left grass stuck in the Tīnui substation fence. Power is now back on. Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
Slips now cover the east Wairarapa hills Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
Several hundred locals made it to the meeting - including some from Riversdale and Castlepoint, which had not been hit as severely. And while many were doing it tough, they still found the heart to clap loudly and often for the truckers, farm stores, builders and wi-fi installers who had been helping them out in the wake of the cyclone.
Hundreds turned out, some by chopper, for Sunday's post-Cyclone Gabrielle community meeting in Tīnui, on the east coast of Wairarapa. Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
Homemade baking provided to whānau at a community meeting in Tīnui on the east coast of Wairarapa, post-Cyclone Gabrielle. Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
Food donated to help local families in and around Tīnui, Wairarapa, after damage to roads and buildings from Cyclone Gabrielle Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
The storm hit the area midday on Tuesday, with flooding coming right up the main road to the intersection where the school and a craft store face each other. Both were flooded.
Melissa Hanson at the Tīnui crossroads on Sunday, which mark the peak of where the Cyclone Gabrielle floodwaters waters reached on Tuesday Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
By Sunday, the winding Whareama River, which flows south, had sunk back between its banks, after its waters plastered thick mud on fields and roads, and through Stu Sowry's Tīnui pub, to just a finger span or two below the bar itself.
He said he needed manpower now to clean up.
"An event like this is like a series of mountain ranges, you know, the first day is one mountain range, you sweep the mud out, the next day you have got another mountain range."
Floodwaters reached almost to the bartop and this coffee machine, at the Tīnui pub. Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
Ruined chairs outside the Tīnui pub. Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
Volunteer firefighters from all over the district and as far away as Upper Hutt spent two days hosing out silt - but there was still so much left to do in a settlement where 20 to 25 buildings had flooded.
Stu and his wife Cindy Sowry had put the pub on the market just days before the storm hit.
Asked how hard it had been, Sowry choked up a little.
"Ah, we've already decided we won't reopen the pub ourselves.
"If the locals want to, they can go for it. ...We don't want to see it go, we just won't be the ones running it."
Stu Sowry says his mind's made up, and he's not looking to reopen the Tīnui pub. Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
Beer mats hung outside during the clean-up Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
Among the four or five casual jobs that were now on the line was Melissa Hansen's - though her partner would keep his farm job.
"Probably lost my job, yeah, pretty sh**," she said.
Tīnui school would open up for 50 or so children this week, but not in their own classrooms, they would have to run classes in the preschool playgroup rooms at the back.
Some would bus in from the coast, like builder Joe Vermeer's son. "He'll be quite excited, but the last two days have been pretty exciting for them here," Vermeer said.
The schoolkids would be in the playgroup building, which unlike their classrooms had not flooded - it was just slightly further up the rise.
Rubbish outside Tīnui school after fire-fighters hosed silt from classes and the field. Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
But principal Simon Couling was most pleased about the firefighters cleaning out the pool, which had been tiptopped with a slurry of brown water.
School principal Simon Couling, in a classroom after they were hosed out by firefighters following flooding in Tīnui, near the Wairarapa coast, during Cyclone Gabrielle. Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
"It's really good for the kids to have something to look forward to. And they love the pool," Couling said.
"We've got swimming sports in a couple of weeks. So if we can just give them that, as a start, it's all we need, as a toe-hold.
"Otherwise it's just devastation for them."
In the end, whether the coastal kids would make it to class was going to depend on the bus driver's call on whether the roads were safe enough.
School would restart in the playgroup building Photo: RNZ/ Phil Pennington
Alerts from the National Emergency Management Agency for 19 February
- Keep up to date with advice from your local CDEM Group or from civildefence.govt.nz
- Floodwaters may be full of sewage, chemicals and other hazardous materials and should be avoided as much as possible
- Floodwater can carry bacteria that can contaminate food
- Protect yourself when cleaning up flood water and mud by wearing a properly fitted P2- or N95-rated mask, goggles, gloves, long pants, long-sleeved shirt, and gumboots or work shoes
- Throw away all food and drinking water that has come in contact with floodwater
- Do not eat garden produce if the soil has been flooded
- In power outages use torches instead of candles, and only use camp cookers and BBQs outdoors.
- Conserve water where you are advised to
- Check the location of pipes and cables before you dig; see Chorus' Before You Dig website and beforeudig.co.nz for all utilities
- The best way to assist in the response is through financial donations and NOT through donated goods.