North Island Severe Weather Event Update #3

9 Haratua 2023

Fire and Emergency New Zealand has received more than 300 weather-related calls for help between the hours of 8am - 6pm on Tuesday.

Nineteen of the total calls were from Northland, while 286 came from Auckland.

Almost half of those calls came through between the hours of 12pm and 1pm.

About 100 of these were classed as urgent and the rest were classed as non-urgent.

While the rain has eased for now, Brad Mosby, on-call Commander for Tāmaki Makaurau, says people need to remain vigilant.

"There is still more rain forecast, which may cause surface flooding to return. Please continue to avoid unnecessary travel tonight as there may still be floodwater around.

"It’s dangerous to travel through floodwater and should never be done. It’s difficult to judge the depth and currents during the daytime and impossible after dark," he says.

Brad Mosby thanked the public for their understanding and patience throughout the day.

"We couldn’t get to every call immediately due to the volume of calls we received, but late this afternoon we had been able to clear almost all of the incidents we received calls about."

As the thunderstorms moved south, Fire and Emergency received 48 weather-related calls in the Bay of Plenty area from 4pm - 6pm. Of these, 22 were in the Tauranga area and 15 were in the Rotorua area.

For the latest weather warnings follow MetService, and follow NZ Civil Defence and your local Civil Defence page for emergency warnings and advice.

A further update has not been scheduled for this evening, but will be provided should it be required.