Auckland mayor under fire as floods death toll rises
The mayor of Auckland has been attacked over the city council’s slow response to the record rains that have devastated the city and killed four people since Friday.
The mayor of Auckland, New Zealand’s largest city, has come under fire over the city council’s slow response to the record rains that have devastated the city and killed four people since Friday.
The country’s largest city saw 249 millimetres of rainfall on Friday, smashing the previous record of 161mm in a 24-hour period, and Auckland’s 1.6 million residents remain under a state of emergency.
But on Friday night, as drivers abandoned their cars on motorways, streets in central Auckland were turned into rivers and home owners were filmed wading shoulder deep in water, mayor Wayne Brown told Radio NZ: “What we really need is for the rain to stop.”
A state of emergency was finally put in place at 10.30pm but not before Christopher Luxon, leader of the National Party, took to Twitter to demand action.
At a heated press conference on Saturday Mr Brown attempted to defend the council’s response but by Sunday a change.org petition demanding his resignation was gathering hundreds of signatures.
Two bodies were found in floodwater at separate Auckland locations on Friday night in the northern suburb of Wairau Valley, and a third was discovered Saturday after a landslide brought down a home in the upmarket suburb of Remuera.
On Sunday a drone operator discovered the body of a man about a kilometre from where he was swept away on Friday at Onewhero, south of Auckland.
Among the dead was surfer Daniel Newth who died trying to escape the floods by kayak, Daniel Miller, who had earlier filmed himself helping other people caught in the floodwater in Wairau and Dave Lennard, whose Remuera home was hit by a landslide.
Mr Newth’s father told the NZ Herald: “He went down the road and it was too powerful, the water, and it swept him away, down underneath the culverts.
“He didn’t make it. He drowned.”
Mr Miller had shared videos of himself going to help people on Facebook, saying in one clip:
“Something’s telling me to go up and check on the people in this house, so I’m going to.”
Shortly afterward, another clip – the last – appears to show him dropping his phone in the water.
New Zealand’s deputy Prime Minister Carmel Sepuloni told a press conference in Auckland on Sunday: “The flooding situation has been a traumatic experience for everyone in Auckland.
“The most horrific part of it has been that we have lost lives.”
Ms Sepuloni, who is also MP for the West Auckland suburb of Kelston, added: “What we saw on Friday was unprecedented and I acknowledge there will be a lot of emotion and uncertainty that comes with being displaced.”
However she said it was “heartening” to see communities come together to help each other.
“We do have each others’ backs, it’s been so incredibly heartening to see the mammoth community impact first-hand,” she said.
Emergency officials announced on Sunday that at least 19 homes had been ‘red-stickered’ - marked uninhabitable - with more expected among the 5000 Aucklands homes yet to be assessed.
At the peak of the flooding on Friday, around 24,000 homes were without power, according to Transport Minister Michael Wood.
Ms Sepuloni said that by Sunday around 3,000 homes were still without electricity, and a number of homes were without water, including hers.
Meanwhile a second region was placed under a state of emergency as the catastrophic rains moved south, continuing to wreak havoc across the North Island.
As Aucklanders were advised to use the brief respite on Sunday and Monday to clean up before another “atmospheric river” sweeps in on Tuesday, the Waitomo District, 190km south, declared a state of emergency with evacuations amid widespread flooding and landslides.
The entire peninsula of Coromandel, a popular tourist area 168km south of Auckland was cut off, a freight train derailed in the Bay of Plenty as it tried to cross flood waters, and a landslide in Tauranga, north of Lake Taupo, swept a house into the middle of a road.
Visiting Auckland on Saturday in his first major incident since taking office on Wednesday, Prime Minister Chris Hipkins offered his condolences to the families of the victims, describing the crisis as: “an unprecedented event in recent memory.”
“The level of devastation in some areas is considerable,” he said.
“The loss of life underscores the scale of this weather event and how quickly it turned tragic.”.
More than 6000 insurance claims have been lodged since Friday evening, with companies saying the Auckland floods could be the “biggest weather-related claims event in our history”.
Further south, an interislander ferry on its way from Picton in the South Island to Wellington, sent out a mayday on Saturday night after losing power in 100km winds in the Cook Strait. The 800 passengers on board the Kaitaki were sent to emergency stations and issued life jackets as the ferry drifted, out of control, with anchors down. The vessel eventually regained some power but had to be accompanied by tug boats to safe haven in Wellington.
In one of the few lighter moments of the disaster, Greens MP Chloe Swarbrick shared a picture of singer Lorde dropping off supplies at a community centre.
Meanwhile Transport Accident Investigation Commission has opened an investigation into how Air NZ flight NZ124 from Melbourne to Auckland lost control in high winds on the runway on Friday, destroying runway light.
TAIC chief accident investigator Naveen Kozhuppakalam said: “Shortly after touchdown, the pilot briefly lost directional control, and the aircraft veered away from the runway centre-line.
“The pilot regained control, completed the landing, and taxied the aircraft to the airport terminal.
“There was damage reported to six runway edge lights and to the aircraft’s undercarriage assembly, including deflation of one tyre.”
Auckland Airport opened to international travel on Sunday after it closed Friday night and Saturday morning with temrinals flooded, but flights remain disrupted.
With thunderstorms expected on Sunday night, Aucklanders have been advised to keep travel to a minimum.
With AFP
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