New Zealand

• Cyclone Gabrielle pounded the country’s north.
• The government declared a nationwide state of emergency on Tuesday.
• The disaster is New Zealand’s worst weather event in a century.

Residents in New Zealand have been forced to swim to safety from flooded homes after Cyclone Gabrielle pounded the country’s north.

Due to the devastation caused by the storm, the government declared a nationwide state of emergency on Tuesday, only the third time in history.

According to Prime Minister Chris Hipkins, the disaster is New Zealand’s worst weather event in a century.

On Tuesday, officials said that at least 225,000 individuals were without power.

A firefighter has gone missing after becoming entangled in a landslide in Muriwai, west of Auckland. According to emergency officials, a second firefighter was gravely hurt.

The storm’s devastation was most severe in coastal villages on the North Island’s far north and east coasts, with Hawke’s Bay, Coromandel, and Northland among the most hit.

A third of New Zealand’s 5.1 million people reside in affected areas.

Marcelle Smith, who lives in a cliff-front property at Parua Bay on the east side of the North Island, told she escaped inland with her two small children on Monday night to safer ground.

Her husband had stayed behind to secure the family’s home. Some of the embankments that had been built had already been washed away, and they were still dealing with severe weather on Tuesday.

“We are trying to do everything we can to protect what we have put our lives into. It’s man versus nature at this point,”

According to local media, some Hawke’s Bay residents were forced to swim through bedroom windows to escape when floods overwhelmed their homes. Residents in the area have been warned that they may be without electricity for several weeks.

Aerial photographs of flooded areas showed individuals stranded on rooftops, awaiting assistance.

The destruction is massive, with uprooted trees, bent street lights and poles, and row after row of flooded dwellings.

The New Zealand Defence Force published dramatic images of officials rescuing a stranded sailor whose yacht was washed out to sea after its anchor rope snapped in high winds. Authorities say it was discovered off the coast of Great Barrier Island after an overnight search.

Overnight, more than 100 people rushed to evacuation centers in Auckland, according to officials.

“The severity and extent of the destruction that we are witnessing are unprecedented in a generation,” Mr. Hipkins said on Tuesday.

“We are still putting together a picture of the cyclone’s effects as it moves forward. But we do know that the impact is strong and ubiquitous.”

He has pledged NZ$11.5 million (£6 million; US$7.3 million) in charity to those affected by the disaster.

The storm was hailed as “unprecedented” by the Minister for Emergency Management, Kieran McAnulty, who declared a national state of emergency on Tuesday morning.

The emergency order enables the government to streamline its response to the disaster. It has been applied to the Northland, Auckland, Tairawhiti, Tararua, Bay of Plenty, Waikato, and Hawke’s Bay regions.

Only twice before has New Zealand proclaimed a national state of emergency: during the commencement of the Covid-19 pandemic and after the 2011 Christchurch earthquake.

The government has blamed the magnitude of the calamity on climate change.

“Of course, the severity of it is exacerbated by the fact that our global temperatures have already risen by 1.1 degrees,” said climate change minister James Shaw.

“We must stop making excuses for our inaction. When the beach is flooded, we can’t put our heads in the sand. We must act immediately.”

Cyclone Gabrielle made landfall in New Zealand just two weeks after heavy rains and flooding in the same area killed four people.

The country’s meteorological agency, MetService, on Tuesday, said Auckland had received about half of its annual rainfall in just the first 45 days of 2023.

The MetService says conditions are expected to clear in the coming days, and heavy rain warnings are being lifted for some parts of the country. But it has warned that wind could still cause further damage.

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• Authorities have issued severe weather warnings.
• New Zealand is considering imposing a national state of emergency for the third time in the country’s history.
• Many schools and local government buildings are closed across Auckland and the North Island.

Cyclone Gabrielle has knocked out power to 46,000 houses in New Zealand‘s north.

Authorities have issued severe weather warnings, and hundreds of flights have been canceled.

As Gabrielle approaches the North Island, some areas have declared a state of emergency.

It comes only weeks after record rains in Auckland and adjacent areas caused floods and killed four people.

“Extreme weather event has come on the back of extreme weather event,” said New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins, who announced an NZ$11.5m (£6m; US$7.3m) aid package.

“Things are likely to get worse before they get better.”

Kieran McAnulty, minister of emergency management, said during a press conference on Monday that the government is considering imposing a national state of emergency for the third time in the country’s history.

Five northern regions, including Auckland, have already declared a state of emergency. The declaration empowers local governments to respond to unsafe conditions by restricting travel and providing relief.

Metservice in New Zealand reported that Whangarei, a city north of Auckland, has received 100.5mm (4in) of rain in the previous 12 hours.

Mr. McAnulty added that Monday would be a “critical day” due to the “highly dangerous” combination of high winds and heavy rain. Winds of up to 140km/h (87mph) battered the Northland region, while Auckland Harbour Bridge was rocked by gusts of 110km/h.

He cautioned that restoring the electricity grid may take days because the terrible weather rendered it “unsafe” to work on the network.

Weather officials had earlier downgraded Gabrielle’s intensity, but Metservice in its latest update on Monday said it will still bring “significant heavy rain and potentially damaging winds”.

Despite the fact that the cyclone has yet to make landfall, it has already uprooted trees, damaged roads, and brought down power lines.

Many schools and local government buildings are closed across Auckland and the North Island, and people are being advised not to travel if at all possible.

Meanwhile, 509 flights were canceled, affecting around 10,000 overseas Air New Zealand passengers.

Normal service is anticipated to resume on Tuesday, with the national carrier adding 11 more domestic flights to its schedule to aid in recovery efforts.

The cyclone is the second major weather event to strike Auckland and the North Island in as many weeks.

According to authorities, the two huge occurrences have strained the emergency and recovery response system.

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• Cyclone Gabrielle is expected to encompass the upper half of the North Island.
• Cyclone battered the country’s northern tip on Sunday.
• Emergency conditions in Auckland after a flash flood.

WELLINGTON – As a cyclone battered the country’s northern tip on Sunday, New Zealand‘s prime minister cautioned citizens to hunker down and prepare an evacuation plan.

Cyclone Gabrielle is expected to encompass the upper half of the North Island over a 48-hour period beginning Sunday evening, two weeks after severe floods in the same region.

Auckland is still in an emergency condition after flash floods flooded the city on January 27, killing four people and displacing others.

Debris from that flood remains on the streets of the country’s largest city, which is now bracing for another round of heavy rain and strong winds.

Flooding, massive ocean swells, and severe winds, according to Prime Minister Chris Hipkins, should prepare everyone.

“Our main message to people across the country is to please take the severe weather warning seriously and to make sure you’re prepared,” he told journalists.

“Make sure you’ve got your grab-and-go kits, make sure you know where you need to go in the event you need to evacuate your homes.”

On Sunday morning, the MetService weather agency recorded wind gusts of up to 140 kilometers per hour (86 miles per hour) in northern New Zealand.

“This system poses a very high risk of extreme, impactful, and unprecedented weather over many regions of the North Island from Sunday to Tuesday,” the MetService said.

On Monday and Tuesday, the cyclone is expected to weaken significantly as it moves slowly south.

On Sunday, strong winds caused the closing of Auckland’s Harbour Bridge, and most flights into and out of Auckland Airport have already been canceled for Monday.

As it reached New Zealand, Gabrielle was downgraded from a tropical cyclone, which meant that wind gusts and rainfall would be slightly less strong.

The storm passed over Australia’s remote Norfolk Island on Saturday night, where there were reports of downed trees and power cuts but no significant damage.

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