Gisborne rain eases, evacuated Mangapapa households head back

The relentless rain has finally eased over Gisborne, and families evacuated from Mangapapa are looking forward to a night at home.

Fifteen houses were evacuated in the early hours of Tuesday morning, from the suburb north of Gisborne’s main centre.

Council crews were out clearing drains and culverts since first light.

Tarei Nia Nia had been evacuated three times in three weeks – twice in Wairoa, and now again in Mangapapa.

The first time in Wairoa came as a bit of a surprise.

“I was washing my car,” she said. “And then I saw all this debris, and I thought, oh, the council must be … clearing the roads.”

But it was not the council. In fact, the Wairoa river had burst its banks.

A police officer told Nia Nia she had only a minute to pack a bag.

Shortly after, they were evacuated from the evacuation centre as well.

Surface flooding on Duncan Street, off Valley Road, in the Gisborne suburb of Mangapapa on Tuesday morning.
Photo: Supplied / Jessica Saxby / Facebook

When she returned for her car hours later, it was full of water, but Nia Nia drove it back to the second evacuation centre, and began bucketing out the water.

“Instead of going inside, I thought no, I was bailing out all this water,” she said.

“These two people came and said, no, no, drop everything, you’ve got to go inside. And I said no, I’m not going anywhere, my car’s flooded and I’ve got to get the water out.”

Since then, she has been through hell and high water for her little Toyota.

The valets in Wairoa lost their equipment in the flood, so she drove to Gisborne to stay with her sister-in-law, and get it professionally cleaned.

“The person who assessed the car said, yes, you need to get this done, get it valeted. If you’re too late, you can’t get all the smell out.”

The insurance company was willing to write it off, but Nia Nia put up a fight.

With the car’s former owner as her local mechanic, she knew she would not get one as good for the same money.

Flooding seen from the air just outside of Te Karaka, near Gisborne on 15 February.
Photo: RNZ / Nate McKinnon

After driving four hours north, she certainly was not expecting another evacuation in Gisborne.

Her sister-in-law, Theodosia Nia Nia, had lived in her house in Lytton Street for 60 years.

It was 6am when she got up to find water spilling out of the toilet bowl.

“When I got there, the water was flowing down onto the floor,” she said.

A look out the window revealed the street was flooded shin-deep, as drains and culverts overflowed.

With the drains outside blocked, water was coming back up the pipes.

“My granddaughter had to wade through the water to bring the car right up by the steps so we could jump in.”

They had spent the day at The House of Breakthrough, which re-opened as an evacuation centre to accommodate the Mangapapa households.

On Tuesday evening, they planned to head back to the house to assess the damage.

Forestry slash seen on the beach at Gisborne after Cyclone Gabrielle on 17 February.
Photo: Supplied / Manu Caddie

The House of Breakthrough assistant pastor Lance Rickard said when he drove in just after 5am, the water level on Ormond Road was two thirds of the way up his tyres.

“There were 15 families to be evacuated here, however a lot of them went to their own whānau.”

Gisborne District Council community lifelines director Dave Wilson said in the past two weeks, the stormwater system had taken a hammering.

Teams had been out removing blockages in culverts since first light.

“The volume of water we’re having [means] debris keeps moving, and that starts to find its chokepoint, and that’s when we start to have issues.”

Teams were working their way across the city, but with every new rainfall, things became harder, and more things piled up.

However, the MetService orange heavy rain warning was lifted on Tuesday afternoon, meaning a chance for crews to get back on track.