SLIP BLOCKS ROAD, RIVER

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30966, 24 January 1966, Page 1

SLIP BLOCKS ROAD, RIVER

Campers Spend Night Trapped (Vrtr Zealand Press Association) INVERCARGILL, Jan. 23. Millions of tons of mud and rock i swept down the northern side of Mid Dome. 67 miles from Invercargill, on ’ Saturday night to cut off the Mataura river and trap campers.

Th e river flowed over the road, making it impassable.

This afternoon the river cut its way through the shingle after the water had risen 12 feet above normal, and men and machines cleared the road to allow about 12 groups of campers to drive out.

Torrential rain on Saturday afternoon loosened the steep face of the 5000 ft peak, and two slips flowed down the lower slopes toward campers. In places the shingle and mud was 20ft deep and workers clearing the road in rain which had not eased found themselves sinking up to two feet in mud.

One man. Mr P. Brun, of Balfour, in the area on a fishing expedition with his three children, sank up to his waist trying to get out on Saturday night. With the help of a board from his trailer, and with his children roped together and following him, he managed to walk to the Parawa Hotel, about two miles away. Campers kept a wary eye on the movement of the shingle and shifted to higher ground for the night as the river began to rise. “SEA OE SHINGLE"

Mr D. Armstrong, of Christchurch, said he had been ready to move clear of the river but had not found it necessary. He had intended to move out on Saturday night, but had not been able to. “We were having tea about 6.30 when we looked out and a saw a bank of shingle ploughing down the hillside where a trickle of water had been flowing,” he said. “It was moving about two miles and hour and spreading out. It was a whole sea.” The slips made a “terrific

roar,” said Mr F. L. Here, the owner of the Nokomai station further along the road. He was out fencing when he heard the slip.

The rain, accompanied by vivid flashes of lightning, began about 4.15 p.m., Mr Hore said. Other accounts said the rain eased at 6.30 p.m. The engineer for the Southland Catchment Board 'Mr R. D. Young) visited the area this afternoon. He said the level of the river where the slip crossed had risen by two feet at 7 p.m., a further seven feet between 9 p.m. and 9.15 p.m. and another three feet in the next six hours. Late this afternoon the level had started to fall as the water wore a channel through the slip. FISH DYING The river was “a sea of kakahi,” and many fish were floating or dying in water below the slip when the water became too shallow or too muddy. Both slips had fronts of almost 200 yards, but in each case only about 20 yards caused the disruption. In some places the front had bulldozed top-soil as it went, but in other parts shrubs were still showing above the 'shingle cover. Only one caravan is still in the area. The camper decided not to risk being caught if his car got stuck pulling the caravan out.

The slip on Saturday was the second in just over a year. On December 29, 1964, two slips were loosed from Mid Dome. One demolished fences and crops on the Mid Dome Soil Conservation Station and stopped just short of the Invercargill-Queens-town highway. At the same time a slip moved to within about 50 yards of campers in the Nokomai Gorge, near where Saturday's slip stopped.