A massive slip near Tiniroto, Tairāwhiti, seen from the air during a Civil Defence flight as experts assessed the damage from Cyclone Gabrielle, on 18 February, 2023.
Photo: RNZ/ Kate Green
Gisborne has been hit hard by Cyclone Gabrielle. It’s now five days since the storm, and Civil Defence is running fly-overs of the region to assess damage and work out where to send supplies. Reporter Kate Green went along on one of these flights.
The floor of the small hangar at the back of Gisborne Airport had by Saturday become a through-point for anyone and anything flying in or out of the city.
That afternoon, it was a staging area for goods being flown to the worst-hit parts of the region – food, bottled water, LPG bottles and petrol, nappies, and medicine.
One large cardboard box, among many sitting waiting on the concrete floor, had a hand-written note stuck to the top. A border of dried flowers had been hastily taped around it.
Signs of rivers bursting their banks, flooding, silt and slips now mark the Tairāwhiti landscape
Photo: RNZ/ Kate Green
Pilots rotated through the choppers, all suitable aircraft now under the control of the Defence Force to run disaster response jobs like food deliveries, passenger drop-offs, and reconnaissance flights.
Dr Murry Cave, the council’s principal scientist and an invaluable source of local and technical knowledge for Civil Defence, had holes to fill in his intel.
The one he hoped to fill on Saturday was a big black spot west of Gisborne, from which there had no been information about the state of the land or its residents.
The slip reached from the hilltop down to the house, near Tiniroto, Tairāwhiti
Photo: RNZ/ Kate Green
The helicopter took off about 2pm and tracked west to Tiniroto, where a huge slip was reportedly threatening a house.
It did not take long to find – it was monstrous, a sea of mud and stones that must have come crashing down the hill with a rumble, leaving a chunk missing from the hillside.
It now rested within metres of the homestead, and as the helicopter wheeled around it, the scale of it was breath-taking.
Cave made a note to return on foot, and the helicopter swung away.
Bridges sit amongst damage along rivers
Photo: RNZ/ Kate Green
Only minutes later, and clearly visible even from 1000 feet, the water pipe leading away from the Waingake water treatment plant came into view.
It was obviously snapped in two places here, and there were more breakages further along.
Gisborne’s water was now coming from the smaller Waipaoa plant, which was struggling to keep up with demand.
Forestry slash had built up at the foot of this bridge
Photo: RNZ/ Kate Green
Residents were urged to use their water sparingly – only for short showers, food preparation and drinking, but the council maintained the water was safe to drink.
The chopper followed the Wairoa River southward, mirroring its curves from the sky.
The Waingake water treatment plant seen from the air on Saturday
Photo: RNZ/ Kate Green
The water far below was muddied, a churned up greyish-brown with the path of its recent surge, up beyond the banks, evident still. The earth either side of the river was caked with silt, cracking and slumping down toward the river.
The Mangapoike River, where it joined the Wairoa River, had forestry slash backed up for more than 50 metres at the bridge. It lined the banks and dammed the river.
Despite these patches of destruction, the farmland seemed to be relatively unscathed. Slips were few and far between, on a scale far less devastating than the March 2022 floods, Cave said, when Gisborne was hit by 3 months worth of rain in the space of a day.
He would later point out a map he had drawn up, now pinned to a wall at the council offices, showing each slip that happened during those floods as a coloured dot. On Saturday, it was clear – this part of the region had fared far better this time.
This, of course, was a good thing. It meant money, manpower and aid could be pointed elsewhere, and Civil Defence could check the box being in the clear.
Wairoa from above, on Saturday
Photo: RNZ/ Kate Green
Wairoa was a different story. It was a tale of two cities – the area north of the river had been ravaged by the flood waters, and remained caked in a layer of mud.
On an earlier expedition to the township, residents told us the river burst its banks and came raging through their properties on Wednesday afternoon.
But south of the river, colourful rooftops stood out against the green of clean grass. The helicopter did not land, and swung back to the north.
Flooding near the coast
Photo: RNZ/ Kate Green
Back in town, the sun was sinking on the fifth day of limited communications connectivity and patchy power, and anxiety among its residents was running high. There were extra police officers in the region to combat any opportunistic crime amid the confusion, but people had nearly come to blows over petrol, road rules, and ATM queues.
Eighty-five homes had been yellow-stickered and 10 red-stickered, with many more expected as inspectors make their way around the region.
But cellular connection was coming back online, and the sun shone on Saturday.
Inside the council buildings, Civil Defence put a small tick next to a small section of map, and looked to the next one.
Discussion about this post