Kerre Woodham: When did weather become such a big deal that it dominates the news?

Speaking of the bad weather, it brings me to the emergency mobile alerts. The emergency mobile alerts came about because Fire and Emergency and the National Emergency Management Agency and other agencies including New Zealand Police, Ministry of Primary Industries and Ministry of Health use emergency mobile alerts to alert people if their lives, property or health are at serious risk.

I'm pretty sure they came about during Covid, I can't recall them before then you might, but I think it was pretty much a Covid response and that's continued to include any other times where lives, property or health are at serious risk. Over the past week.

Aucklander’s have received about four or five emergency alerts on their phones, and I'll tell you what, they give you an absolute conniption when they start screeching. You know it takes you right back, the adrenaline surges through, you think, fight or flight ... okay there's bad weather coming. Well, yes, a cyclone had been forecast to be arriving over the North Island. So, you would imagine with a tropical cyclone bad weather comes - thunderstorms, the potential for flooding.

And then the next lot of emergency alerts came to warn of the potentials of dangerous gases as a result of a recycling plant in a suburb of Auckland going up in flames and once that fire started, many, many suburbs around the fire were advised to stay inside and then another alert gave the all clear sometime later.

I do understand that Civil Defence is damned if they do and damned if they don't. Some Aucklander’s were asking why they weren't warned about the severe thunderstorms and deluges on the Friday night of Easter weekend. But surely, we all knew that a cyclone was sitting over the North Island, and cyclones bring rain and thunderstorms. But there was criticism because they hadn't been warned, so therefore we got warnings up the Ying Yang in response.

Meteorologists defended themselves, saying well, thunderstorms are notoriously difficult to predict, and weather is notoriously difficult to predict. We saw that with Gabrielle as well. In February 2023, the Esk River in Hawkes Bay burst its banks and flooded the entire valley. Hundreds of Hawkes Bay resid

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Carrywood and Morning's podcast from news Talks, he'd.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
Be speaking of the bad weather. Though. It brings me
to the emergency mobile alerts. The emergency mobile alerts come
about because fire an emergency, and the National Emergency Management
Agency and other agencies including New Zealand Police, Ministry of
Primary Industries and Ministry of Health use emergency mobile alerts

(00:33):
to alert people if their lives, property or health are
at serious risk. I'm pretty sure they came about during COVID.
I can't recall them before then you might, but I
think it was pretty much a COVID response and that's
continued to include any other times where lives, property, or

(00:56):
health or serious risk. Over the past week, Aucklanders have
received about four or five emergency alerts on their phones.
And I tell you what. They give you an absolute
conniption when they start screeching. You know, it takes you
right back. It puts you into as I suppose they're
designed to do. The adrenaline surges through you think fight

(01:18):
or flight, looking around, trying to work out with your arms,
coming for the phone. Right, okay, right, okay, there's bad
weather coming. Well, yes, a cyclone had been forecast to
be arriving over the North Island. So you would imagine
with a tropical cyclone comes bad weather, the thunderstorms, the

(01:42):
potential for flooding, and then the next lot of emergency
alerts came to warn of the potentials of dangerous gases
as a result of a recycling plant in a suburb
of Auckland going up in flames. And once that fire started,
residents and a huge catchment around the fire, many many

(02:02):
suburbs around the fire were advised to stay inside, and
then another alert gave the Auklear sometimes later, sometime later.
I do understand that civil defense is damned if they
do and damned if they don't. Some Aucklanders were asking
why they weren't warned about the severe thunderstorms and dallages
on Friday night, the Friday night of East weekend. But

(02:26):
surely we all knew that a cyclone was sitting over
the North Island and cyclones bring rain and thunderstorms. But
there was criticism because they hadn't been warned, so therefore
we got warnings up the ying Yang. In response, meteorologists
defended themselves saying, well, thunderstorms are notoriously difficult to predict,

(02:49):
and it is wea there is notoriously difficult to predict.
We saw that with Gabrielle as well. In February twenty
twenty three, the Esk River and Hawks Bay burst its
banks and flooded the entire valley. Hundreds of Hawk's Bay
residents woke in the middle of a a nightmare with
water surging through their homes and there was no alert,

(03:10):
no warning. They hadn't been evacuated from the area, and
yet the cyclone had been predicted. Schools had been closed
in Hamilton and Toroonga and those areas were unaffected. But
Hawks Bay was absolutely hammered. So if it's an imperfect science,

(03:30):
an imprecise and inexact science, are we depending far too
much on meteorologists who don't know They can give you
a broad spectrum sort of well, this is this is
going to be happening. We can expect thunderstorms, we can

(03:52):
expect electric storms, we can expect heavy rain over the
next week. We can't tell you that it's going to
arrive at your house at this time, so be prepared.
And I wonder if perhaps too many people are expecting
that from authorities, from decision makers, We've become very used

(04:17):
to having people tell us what we should do, how
we should do it, to keep ourselves safe. I'm not
entirely sure you can do that with weather. It is unpredictable,
it changes. Meteorologists will tell you that they can really
only give you a broad spectrum. And if you're depending

(04:41):
on government agencies to tell you what to do and
where to go and how you should cope, I think
that way lies disaster really, because you'll think, well, I
haven't had a warning, so I should be fine. People

(05:02):
will let me know if I'm in danger, and you
start to lose Spidey instinct, you start to lose your
spidy senses. It's too many alerts too are going to
mean that people will just switch off. They'll either switch
off their phones and go, well, I'm not going to
have my heart racing and my pulse racing and the

(05:24):
adrenaline surging through me for a fire that's happening ten
suburbs over that really doesn't affect me. If we start
to switch off, then again, emergency services will be blamed
because they sent out too many. I suppose it's helpful

(05:45):
having someone to blame other than God and the weather.
But when did weather becomes such a big deal that
it dominates the news? Meteorologists are becoming the new public
health officials, and when did we stop using our common

(06:08):
sense and relying on government agencies to tell us what
to do and weather? Do you need to know through
your emergency mobile alerts? What is happening? Does that give
you the opportunity to take precautions? They generally arrive too
late and it's generally not in the area. What purpose

(06:31):
do the agency serve? I'd really love to hear your
thoughts on this one.

Speaker 1 (06:34):
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