Torrential rain causes flooding in Gisborne amid raft of weather watches

Torrential rain has caused some surface flooding in Gisborne – and there are more dark clouds on the horizon.

Gisborne and the Bay of Plenty have been hit by the worst of the weekend’s heavy rain, but much of the country has experienced at least some wet weather.

There had been surface flooding on some roads, which had eased, Gisborne District Council Civil Defence emergency manager Ben Green said.

“Some roads are very fragile, and we [will still] get another two days of rain, so will no doubt need to keep an eye on things.”

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There were some lulls in the rain especially over last two-three hours, he said.

“River levels all behaving and are steady.”

Wind coming around the bottom of a low pressure system over the Tasman Sea, off the upper North Island, is pushing rain to the East Coast, MetService meteorologist Dan Corrigan said.

There are heavy rain watches in place for western Bay of Plenty, Gisborne, Hawke’s Bay and eastern Marlborough.

Between Gisborne city and Tolaga Bay at a station near the Pouawa River, there had been 113.4mm of rain recorded between midday on Friday to 11am on Sunday. Another on Panikau Rd recorded 107.5mm of rain.

“Gisborne is the one out of the watch areas that has had the most [rain] over the last couple of days,” Corrigan said.

A rain station at Tauranga Airport recorded 82.1mm of rain in that same period.

A heavy rain watch – with possible thunderstorms – is in place for Gisborne and the Wairoa District northeast of Nuhaka from 8am on Sunday to 6pm on Monday.

There was also a heavy rain watch for Hawke’s Bay, south of Te Pohue, from 8am Sunday to 9pm Monday and Eastern Marlborough, south of Ward, till 9am on Monday.

Another was in place for Bay of Plenty from Edgecumbe westwards, from 8am Sunday to 6am Monday.

The wasn’t expected to be persistent throughout the warning period, but there was a risk it could reach warning amounts of rain, Corrigan said.

It was also raining on and off north of Bay of Plenty in Coromandel, Auckland and Northland but there were breaks of sunshine between showers.

Auckland was to reach a high of 16C on Sunday, with Wellington to only hit 14C. In Christchurch and Dunedin, it was much the same with highs of 14C.

Corrigan said rain would ease up in most places when the watches ended, but a low pressure system was as forecast at the end of the working week for parts of the North Island – including Gisborne and Bay of Plenty.

That weather system was still a way off and hadn’t yet formed, Corrigan said.

Gisborne District Council posted on Facebook to advise it’d opened the emergency wastewater valve into the Turanganui River due to flooding.

The post advised against fishing, gathering shellfish or water activities in rivers and beaches for at least five days.

“The discharge is highly diluted with rainwater, but there’s still a risk to health.”