Peninsula Top Half and Coromandel Town Isolated

The Coromandel Peninsula and Hauraki Plains awoke this morning to more overnight weather havoc. Day four of the current weather bomb has revealed another wild night.

The top half of the Coromandel Peninsula is again cut off. Thames Coast Road from Tararu and Whangapoua there are 25 slips. Waiomu to Coromandel is closed, Whangapoua Hill road is closed.

At Te Aroha the Waihou River flooded closing local roads, while at Ngatea there was a call for sand bags during the night.

Power was cut to Thames, Te Puru and Kaiaua.

Power outages have resulted from last night event when Thames and the Hauraki Plains experienced driving rain along with an electrical storm which filled the sky with sheet light. The low area of the Thames Golf Club went underwater before dark, while the Kauaeranga River spilled over onto the road.

Police along with fire and emergency crews, were called out to free vehicles ahead of potential flooding and closed SH25 Thames Coast Road.

This was after local civil defence officials described yesterday as the most destructive storm day so far.

Roads crews had to deal with 14 slips between Coromandel and Whitianga. Additional to these were slips on the Thames Coast Road, Colville Road, the Port Jackson Road was closed, before the entire Peninsula was isolated from Thames and Waihi, with eastern sections of SH25 becoming submerged. SH25A is closed indefinitely as is the 309 and Tapu Coroglen Roads

Waka Kotahi provided an update on SH25A yesterday Cara Lorder telling CFM that investigations were underway to determine if a temporary route could be cut around the massive slip.

She said there was no easy fix and crews would not be able to commence work until area area was dry and safe.

CFM providing 30-minute weather updates on air or on Facebook at Coromandel’s CFM.

Civil Defence Controller, Garry Towler, has provided an update today – please click the link below to hear the interview.