Mayor Andrew Little on flooding in the capital

Many Wellingtonians have woken to carnage in the capital.

Cars are floating, 

Early this morning parts of the region were hit with slow moving thunderstorms and intense rain causing cars to float streets to flood, slips, roads closures and evacuations. 

Nick speaks to Mayor Andrew Little who has been out in the suburbs looking at damage. He shares an update on the response so far and official advice for those effected.

MetService is expecting even more rain to fall across Wellington today, with a heavy rain warning in place for parts of the region from 3pm Monday until midnight Tuesday.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Wellington Mornings podcast with Nick Mills
from News talks'd B.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Now Got Wellington Me Andrew Little joining us on the show.

Speaker 3 (00:15):
Good morning Andrew, Good morning Nick.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
But of a horrid couple of days, tell us what
the situation is right now, give us the latest.

Speaker 3 (00:22):
Yeah, so look at the southern suburbs are wanting to
know are worst effected. I've just been an island Bay
checking out shops and so on there. I know also
Brooklyn is a landslip in Brooklyn. It's been some flooding
in or Federal Bay flooding in Newtown. A lot of
the surface flooding has dissipated. It was just a question
of the stormwater system was just overwhelmed acording cope and
hence the flooding. But a lot of their's dissipated now

(00:45):
and there's now a bit cleanup to take place. I
understand two households have been evacuated and a police and
friends are working with them now. But there's a lot
of cleanup and now there's a bit of anxiety about
the next heavy rain warning, which is for about three
o'clock this afternoon. So I'm just working with counsel officers
to see what sort of protections we can provide par

(01:06):
technically for low lying areas and shops that have been
flooded this morning to prevent any further flooding of those premises.

Speaker 2 (01:13):
That was my next question. Is the worst gone or
if it still going to be just as bad at
three o'clock.

Speaker 3 (01:20):
Well, we don't know. I mean, I was told that
the amount of rain that fell this morning, seventy seven
millimeters in mine hour, is nearly three times the last
highest level of rainfall Willington's ever recorded. It's about two
years ago. So we get these we get the warnings
about these heavy rain on the way, but clearly we
don't have accuracy about just the extent of the heaviness

(01:42):
of the rain. And this morning's rainfall was just absolutely incredible.
I mean, I have to say, living in Island Bay
wiped me up, and I was sort of surprised by
the intensity of it. I expected there would be flooding,
but none of this magnitude that I've seen. People have
showed me the videos and stuff. The parade in Island Bay,
which is sort of flatlong road just running like a river,

(02:04):
honestly running like a river. It was incredible.

Speaker 2 (02:07):
Did we get enough warnings? I believe we did. I
think on Saturday night I had a couple of cancelations
of the restaurant people saying, oh, there's a weather warning
out there. So we did get warnings.

Speaker 3 (02:16):
Didn't we? We did for the weekend, but not I mean,
I don't recall getting I was out and about last
night at an event last night to do I had
no indication of the extent of rainfall that actually happened
this morning. And now maybe that wasn't possible, Maybe that
the natural the information they had didn't indicate it would

(02:37):
be that heavy, But I certainly didn't get in the
notification that there was risk of flooding in low lying
areas to the extent that we had it.

Speaker 2 (02:46):
What do people do, Andrew? If they're in real trouble
today this morning's what's the best piece of advice for them?

Speaker 3 (02:53):
Say, Look, if the property is in danger or anything
like that, they've got to get out. They can call
the emergency services that's called you one one one if
it's about concerned about landslips or anything like that. If
you're just concerned about the land, and then contact the
city council, contact Remo you can get to call them

(03:13):
or get through them on their websites WCC dot GVT
dot Z for the council, w R E m O
dot n Z for REMO. But people will be able
to help. There's there emergency assistants tend to set out
people who do need somewhere to go just for some
comfort or some wolves. There's the Fakamato and Oxford Street
just off Adelaide Road, or the Salvation Army is offering

(03:36):
some someplace in Newtown as well.

Speaker 2 (03:38):
Okay, latest on my point, what's the absolute latest on that?

Speaker 3 (03:42):
Yep, So they did. They had to discharge off out
of a short out for this morning because of the
volume of water. So they're saying, look, don't don't go
on the water for the next couple of days, and
that they'll be just reducing back just to the long
outfall as quickly as possible.

Speaker 2 (03:59):
Thank you for joining us, Maya Andrew Little giving us
the latest well with what's happening. Thank you appreciate your

Speaker 1 (04:07):
For more from Wellington Mornings with Nick Mills, listen live
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