A Wairoa resident said it was “a shock” to be woken up yesterday morning to the sound of emergency crews banging on her window and telling her to evacuate her flooded home.
Hundreds of people were evacuated from their homes in Wairoa yesterday with 400 properties — 100 of them homes — affected.
Marie Tauhine told Breakfast she spent the night at the Wairoa Memorial Hall evacuation centre with 20 others of all ages.
“I’m not quite sure where everyone else is, there’s meant to be over 100 of us displaced… but I do know there was quite a few at the marae over the river.”
She said she had lived in her home for 50 years, and this was the third time they had experienced flooding across the road, but this time the volume of water was “just huge”.
Around 300 properties have been affected by the latest round of rain.
“I waded out in knee-deep water. When I went back later to have a look, the water had risen even higher and got into my house, it got right through my house about 3-4 inches of water through my house.
“This was a real shock… it was a shock when we got woken up by the emergency alarm on our phones. And someone was banging on our window trying to wake us up.
“We were told to ‘get out, it’s in flood’ so we all ran to the front door to have a look and it was just below our top step.
“The cars were sitting in the driveway in the water and I didn’t realise I had water in my car until late yesterday afternoon.”
She said more rain fell last night and this morning fire crews would assess their home to let them know if they’d be allowed back in.
“I’ve also got my insurance company that are waiting for the roads to clear and the rain to stop so they can start taking out the carpet so the floors can dry.
“My floors are… board which is the stuff that puffs up when it gets wet… so, yeah, I was pretty stoked when they said they could come as soon as they could.”
