HEAVY DAMAGE JN WAIROA COUNTY

Evening Post, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 118, 20 May 1914, Page 8

HEAVY DAMAGE JN WAIROA COUNTY

ESTIMATED AT £90,000. HARBOUR WORKS SUFFER. ' ■WAIROA, 3.10 p.m., 20th May. There are unconfirmed ' reports that the Waikaii traffic bridge, erected by the Public Works Department on the Napier-Wairoa road, is gone. The total estimated county flood damage is over £90,000. The river at last has had its way, and broken down one of the harbour walls, causing a gap of some 600 feet in length through the crown of the eastern wall inside the estuary. The breach occurred during the night, when t^ie flood was at its highest, discharging — Mr. Reynolds estimates — in the neighbourhood of 15.000,000 cubic feet per minute. The water over-topping the wail made a rush for the lagoon behind, thus causing a breach. As instancing the severity of the flood, and its dangerous potentialities, tho velocity at the works was from 25 to 30 feet per second, equal to from seventeen to twenty miles per hour. At the town front it was 15 feet per second. [This message delayed in transmission owing to line interruptions.} RIVERS FALLING. '(BY TELEGRAPH.— PRESS ASSOCIATION.) WAIROA, This Day. _ The weather is now clearing and the rivers have been falling slowly since Sunday. Up the Waikare-moana-road 2963 points of rain fell. The Wairoa rose 20ft, but the bridges on the route are safe. The Mohaka bridge, which is a valuable one, stood the great strain. Tho river fell Bft last night. In the Nuhaka and Morore districts little or no damage was done. NAPIER, This Day. All the rivera in Hawkes Bay are rapidly subsiding. No material damage has been reported other than at Wairoa.