Six people were rescued from a flooded house as rural Clevedon bore the brunt of torrential rain flooding parts of Auckland.
A number of people were forced to evacuate during the storm on Wednesday, with some taking refuge in a church.
Locals also say there have been extensive stock losses. One local resident said two horses had been swept away, along with "lots of sheep".
Whitford resident Imogen Neale said friends’ horses have drowned in the floodwaters and stock has swept into their paddocks from neighbouring properties.
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"I have had two horses arrive at my house as their paddocks are underwater and fences have caved in – lots of people in Whitford are offering to take stock [or] horses in."
FLOATING SHEEP CORPSES
Clevedon resident Grant Henson said he and other locals had never seen such extreme flooding in the area.
Water was lapping at his doorstep when the family woke up this morning: "It looked just like an ocean", he said.
His house was on a sheep farm and he said there were "a fair few" woolly corpses floating in the floods.
"A lot of sheep have survived – they’re all piled up like a pile of puppies and they’re the lucky ones," he said.
"But there are also bodies floating around up there . . . Life on the farm, I guess."
Henson and his wife Emma’s cars had become water-logged.
A farm owner took the family – including four children, aged between seven months and 11 years, and two dogs – in his truck to the Presbyterian church in Clevedon’s town centre.
Members of the community had been dropping food packages off at the church.
A friend of the family had lent them a car, Henson said.
The floods had given his family "a bit of perspective".
"Pretty awesome, actually, Mother Nature and what she can do," he said.
"We’ve had plenty of people rally around us, making sure we’re ok.
"The kids had a great adventure this morning."
‘BRAVE’ PONIES RESCUE THEMSELVES
Fifteen polo ponies swam their way to safe ground after their paddock became submerged with water.
Hololio Polo Club president Josephine Elworthy said the ponies had already been moved on Tuesday to a higher paddock on her 40-hectare horse stud farm, but the floodwaters caught them.
Her husband and a neighbour used a rope to lasso open a fence, letting the ponies out.
However, the "nervous" mares had to swim through waters up to "neck deep", she said.
"I went and had a look, the leader pony T.D, good old T.D, spotted me and she came when I called and led the other horses through. She’s very brave.
"It’s quite heart warming, isn’t it? You want a good story on a day like this".
"TORRENTIAL" FLOODWATERS
Horse stud farm owner Sheen Ross said her horses were moved to higher ground on Tuesday as a precaution but the overnight deluge still came as a shock.
"We thought we’d get flooding but we had no idea the flooding would get so bad.
"My brother Neil woke me up at about 1am, it was absolutely torrential".
"Waterfall"-like floodwaters nearly half a metre high coursed through a storage shed, soaking property, she said.
HELICOPTER HELPS RESCUE
Auckland police’s Eagle helicopter assisted a Clevedon family to evacuate on Wednesday morning.
The helicopter helped locals safely extract the husband and wife and their four children from their home near the Wairoa River, a Counties Manukau police spokeswoman said.
Cows in low-lying paddocks had water up past their udders and milled around their flooded paddocks searching for an exit.
Some had jumped over or smashed through fences to reach higher ground.
Water levels were higher than fence posts on some properties, with horses trapped in the lake-like post-and-rail paddocks.
Several roads were impassable due to the huge volumes of muddy water gushing over them.
FLOODING IS "GOING TO GET WORSE"
Clevedon farmer and farmers market organiser Helen Dorresteyn said her family are trapped at their hilltop home.
Floodwaters have submerged a bridge at the base of their Thorpes Quarry Rd property, Dorresteyn said.
It’s the worst flooding her family have seen in 18 years, she said.
"We couldn’t get out to milk the buffalo this morning.
"There’s a lot of water pouring out, there’s baleage floating around, with the rain coming in tonight it’s going to get worse."
Her and husband Richard and two children can ride out the flood for now, she said.
ROAD RE-OPENS
Auckland Civil Defence tweeted that one lane of both Clevedon-Kawakawa Rd and Kawakawa-Orere Rd had been re-opened on Wednesday afternoon.
Traffic management was in place.
Several other main roads in the Clevedon area remained closed.
Clevedon-Kawakawa Rd & Kawakawa-Orere Rd are now open to one lane, traffic management is in place. See single lane marked in orange on map: pic.twitter.com/EVwWuWSeL1
HELP POLICE AVOID "TRAFFIC CHAOS"
Counties Manukau police were pleading with motorists to avoid making unnecessary trips.
Traffic volumes combined with heavy rain and flooding could cause problems, a spokeswoman said.
"It’s going to be chaos. We are concerned at the impact of traffic.
"People [should] stay off the roads or be extremely careful."
BUSY DAY FOR FIRE CREWS
Fire crews had responded to 46 weather-related incidences in Auckland since 6am Wednesday.
Those included the rescue of six people trapped in a flooded house in Clevedon and three cars stuck in floodwater on Mill Rd bridge, Takanini.
An office block and hall flooded at Waiheke Primary School, as did eight homes in Taipan Place, Randwick Park.
At Maraetai, fire crews were called in after sea walls partially collapsed and were breached by waves.
In Okoromai Bay on the Whangaparaoa Peninsula, firefighters tried to rescue a dog that had fallen into a flooded storm drain, but the dog died at the scene.
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