ANOTHER RECORD.

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 306, 28 December 1939, Page 4

ANOTHER RECORD.

WETTEST MONTH EVER

DECEMBER IN WELLINGTON.

DOWNPOUR CAUSES DAMAGE. (By Telegraph.—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, this day. Within a fortnight of the disastrous Hutt Valley floods Wellington experienced another torrential downpour yesterday. From 4 p.m. on Tuesday when the rain began, till 8.30 o'clock last night, a.2sin of rain fell, making the total for December, 15.23 in, the greatest amount of rain ever recorded in Wellington in one month. Two houses, one at Lyall Bay, and one in Karori, were wrecked by slips which also blocked many roads. Cum | wis were flooded out, and water lying on Rongotai aerodrome prevented the arrival or dejiarture of the air liners. This time no flooding occurred in the Hutt Valley, and even at the height of the fall the level of the Hutt River was comparatively low. The reason for this was that the rain came from the south, and the Hutt River is seldom affected except by heavy rain from the hills during easterly and «iorther]y winds. The amount of rain which fell during tho storm was not quit© as much aa fell during the storm of two weeks ago, but nevertheless was nearly twice as much as the average for the month in Wellington. The most ever recorded previously in IX'cember was 12.4 Gin in 1884, and tho most in any month 12.94 in in October, 1904. It was still raining late last night, and it appeared the total for the month to dute, 10.23 in, might be further increased considerably before the end of the month. Undermined when flood waters caused hundreds of tons of earth to slip from the steep hillside below Carlton Road, Lyall Bay, yesterday, the house of Mr. and Mrs. C. R. Dunce, Queen's Drive, toppled over and was completely wrecked. Many other properties in Queen's Drive and Toru Street were covered with sift, in some places to a depth of several feet, and the roadway at the junction of the two streets was block«l. The hillside where the slip occurred is formed of sandy soil which offered little resistance to the water. About li> months ago a bad slip occurred there, starting above Carlton Road and blocking Sutherland Road. Repair work was carried out by the City Council, but it failed completely. The slip has destroyed the drainage, water, gas and electric power services, and a number of residences will be inconvenienced till repairs can be made. Telephone wires also came down. Thrust off its foundations by a moving clay bank a five-roomed wooden house at 37, Nottingham Street, Karori, was moved seven feet forward and wrecked yesterday. The house was shifted about a foot forward by a slip of clay during the heavy rain a fortnight ago, and it has not been occupied since. The previous slip crushed in the washhouse at the back, threw the dwelling out of plumb and cracked the chimney. The house was occupied by Mr. and Mrs. R. T. Norton, and their daughter, aged 13, but when the damage occurred two week* ago they left the house and have since lived with their next door neighbours. Many' houses in Island Bay suffered considerably from flooding and parts of the Parade Slid Derwent Street were still under watir at midday. Early in the morning tBS water began to back up in the middle of the valley and trams were uiiifcle to proceed beyond Medway Street* At one stage buses were used to J* 1 "® passengers to the city from the lower end of the Bay. From daylight onwards several slips of varying slzeslcaine down on the west side of the valley. TJie most serious sufferers from the, flooding in Wellington were the occupiers of 200 tents at the camping ground at Scot* College, where s the water lay in places to a depth of two feet. _ During Tuesday night, with the exception of a strip a few yards wide round the edge of the ground, the entire camping area was flooded. Food and clothing were soaked. Although water seeped into some of the tents at the Centennial motor camp at Miramar no damage was caused, the stormwater drains working very effectively.