In New Zealand, rescuers with a helicopter and boat rescued several people stranded in the rapidly rising tides from Storm Gabrielle. A national emergency was declared due to the storm.
More than 200,000 households were left without electricity and thousands of people were forced to leave their homes. Some arrived late and were stranded on the roofs of their homes by flooding.
A family living near Karekare Beach, west of Auckland, has been hit by a storm. According to The New Zealand Herald, his house was hit by a landslide last night. The hill they lived in collapsed.
“We were all outside running down the concrete steps that my great-uncle laid about 50 years ago, and the steps began to thump. We ran right away,” says the mother of the family. “My husband was behind me and he looked behind him and saw the whole house slide down the hill.”
“We’ve never experienced anything like this here,” one of the neighbors tells Newshub in a video, while the family is busy collecting items from their home. “The damage is incredible.”
A 70-year-old man was also rescued from his sailing yacht at sea today. The man’s catamaran overturned from anchorage yesterday by high waves off the Great Barrier Island of Aotea. Rescuers struggled for a day and a half to save him. Meanwhile, he had drifted about 100 kilometers offshore with his boat.
Several attempts were made by lifeboats and helicopters to rescue him. “It was extremely dangerous,” a sergeant from the Marine Corps of Police told the New Zealand Herald. Otherwise, the man would not have survived as he could no longer control his ship. “Sails and engines stopped working.”
“It was an eventful night for New Zealanders across the country,” Prime Minister Chris Hipkins said today, “but certainly many families have been displaced in the upper North Island and many homes are without electricity.”
Within weeks of being officially New Zealand’s new prime minister, a national emergency has been declared for the third time in New Zealand’s history.
There are also plenty of images of strong winds and floods on social media:
Source: NOS
Karen Clayton is a seasoned journalist and author at The Nation Update, with a focus on world news and current events. She has a background in international relations, which gives her a deep understanding of the political, economic and social factors that shape the global landscape. She writes about a wide range of topics, including conflicts, political upheavals, and economic trends, as well as humanitarian crisis and human rights issues.
