Long Job To Assess Damage

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31657, 18 April 1968, Page 1

Long Job To Assess Damage

<N Z Press Association) INVERCARGILL, April 17. Because floodwaters still lie deep over some parts of Southland, it is not yet possible to assess the cost of flood damage in the eastern and southern .parts of the province. However, damage to roads, bridges, houses, buildings, and stock losses could run into hundreds of thousands of dollars. Two major roads in the province—lnvercargill to Fortrose, and Edendale to Wydham—are still out, as are several minor roads. The Fortrose highway has been cut be-

yond Gorge Road. Floodwaters up to 2ft deep were still swirling across this section late this afternoon. Repairs are being made on the flood-damaged EdendaleWyndham road. Local bodies and the Ministry of Works had their men out in force today repairing roads and bridges. More than 100 Southland County Council staff worked today and yesterday. Some men were called back from their Easter holidays on Monday. Southland County employees today “found” a bridge that had been washed down the Mataura River on Sunday. The old wooden backwater bridge at Mataura Island was four chains downstream from its original site. It had apparently been lifted, piles and all, turned upside down, and swept downstream. More than 60 claims from Wyndham residents have been lodged with the Earthquake and War Damage Commission. About 10 claims have been received from Mataura residents. The Otago and Southland damage bill will probably run close to half a million dollars, according to provisional estimates made by council and Ministry of Works officials. The District Commissioner of Works in Dunedin (Mr J. F. Henderson) said today that his guess of the cost of damage would be about $400,000 —more than half in Southland. State House* External damage of about $lOO,OOO was caused to State houses in the Wellington area. About 1700 State houses in the greater Wellington area, including Hutt Valley and Porirua, were damaged. Mr N. H. Marks, Wellington manager of the State Advances Corporation, said today that most of the damaged houses were now at least protected from the weather.

There had been difficulty getting tiles of older designs for oider houses, and with a general shortage of tilers some of the work would not bo completed for some time. Insurance Backlog Insurance companies are facing a tremendous backlog of work as claims continue to pour in for storm damage. Representatives of insurance companies met in Wellington today to discuss how to handle the many thousands of claims they have received. Member companies of the Insurance Council of New Zealand and the Non-tariff Association met the assessors to try to co-ordinate available resources to do the vast amount of repair work necessary, and to try to arrange some order of priority. A statement from the in-

' surance Council said the rate i at which the claims would be i dealt with would depend to s a large extent on the availt ability of skilled workmen . and material. People could help by lodging details of damage with ! their own insurance company ; immediately. > The secretary of the Insurance Council (Mr N. E.' Fos- • ter) today denied a report ■ that he had said insurance ' companies were facing the • worst crisis in history. “It is not a crisis,” he said. “We are doing everything ! we can to help people. It is ' only a problem of the phy- ■ sical handling of so many > thousands of claims.” s Mr Foster said it would be t many months before the full ■ damage was assessed, but he ! certainly did not think the cost would cause any compan- • ies to “go broke.”