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Northern Advocate, 5 February 1936, Page 6

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FACTORIES RISE ABOVE WATER One of the most remarkable, as it was one of the most praiseworthy, features of the monster floods in Northland was the capable manner in which dairy companies maintained the essential services of collection and manufacture. Both the local factories were hard hit. At Hikurangi the water supply was carried away, but immediately arrangements were made for an emergency service, permitting the making of high-grade butter, as usual. The Whangarei factory itself was badly flooded, and stocktaking is now under way to ascertain losses of material. However, the morning after the flood, fires were restoked, and the silt which had encrusted itself everywhere, swept out, so that when the first cream arrived it could be processed immediately.

Collections Dislocated.

For the first day or so cream collections were seriously dislocated, and it was only through the co-operation of the settlers that anything approaching a skeleton service could be run in some districts.

Today everything is approaching normal again, with the exception of two routes. Cream from herds south of Onerahi is being picked up by launch, reviving for a short time the method used for many years to collect cream fiom farmers on the shores of the Whangarei Harbour. Cans sent forward by settlers in the Pipiwai area, which has been cut off by the partial destruction of the Moengawahine Bridge, is being transported across the Hikurangi River on a wire rope.

There is not a dairy company m the North which has not been faced with the necessity of improvisation, and that there has been so little waste of what is one of the most highly perishable commodities of commerce, reflects great credit upon both the factory staffs and the suppliers.