Napier and Hastings are urban centres but the communities that surround them are rural. The bay area is renowned for its vineyards, orchards and farms. The impact of cyclone Gabrielle on this highly productive land has been immense and restoring these farming areas will take years.
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Destruction of homes and vehicles in the Esk Valley. Photo: Tom Kitchin
Kev Mitchell from the Rural Support Trust gazes out onto the hills around State Highway 5.
He's looking at the damage from the catastrophic Cyclone Gabrielle which ripped apart much of Hawke's Bay.
"Well I know all of these landowners and farmers here personally and this is just soul destroying, seeing the way their farms and farm infrastructure has been wrecked," he says.
Kev Mitchell from the Rural Support Trust. Photo: Tom Kitchin
"It's pretty emotional stuff, there's often one or two lifetimes of work gone into getting these farms up to the standard they were in and in one 12-hour period they've been severely wrecked.
"Rural folk are pretty resilient, this is testing them to the max, we'll need all the support of their friends and neighbours and they are brilliant, they are already doing it. There's community hubs set up just to support each other because you won't get through this alone, this is going to be a really long road to recovery."
Eskdale winemaker Philip Barber is trying desperately to save his wines at the bottom of his building.
"We're going to have to need a lot of diggers in here and bobcats," he says.
"All I'm doing is calm, coping with it, is looking at little at a time... but it's going to be overwhelming. I'm amazed at how we've taken the full impact of this."
The bridge into the small community of Rissington has been smashed to smithereens and the community is having to ferry items across.
"We're running supplies, ferrying supplies with a small jetboat to the people that live on the other side, because there's no access from this end or the other end," resident Phil Blake says.
Newsroom journalist Bonnie Sumner in Meeanee, one of the worst affected areas of Napier. Photo: Tom Kitchin
"We're good as gold...luckily they had the boat, someone brought themselves a Christmas present I think and it's been amazing.''
Newsroom journalist Bonnie Sumner lives in Napier and has been covering the stories of the aftermath, while the same time being without power for days.
"We've moved through the first stage of being just in utter shock and devastation and now we're really in the mood where we just want to get everything done," she says as she describes the mood of the city.
"We want to clean up. There's just so many volunteers, everyone's pitching in and helping out, no matter what it is. Even the kids are getting involved, but we have to be a little bit careful about that because they need to make sure they're wearing masks and gloves now because of the toxic silt."
Hear more about how locals are managing the clean-up by listening to the full podcast episode.
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