THE HAWKE'S BAY FLOOD.

Otago Witness, Issue 2251, 22 April 1897, Page 26

THE HAWKE'S BAY FLOOD.

PARTICULARS OF THE-

DAMAGE.

A GRAPHIC ACCOUNT.

(By Our Special Reporter.") Palmerston NotTH, April 20. The appalling effects of the disaster by flood which has overtaken the Hawke's B^y district will nob be forgotten for many months. The Ecene is one of terrible desolation. Tha loss of life is unusually large. Cattle and sheep hwe perished by thousands. Roads and bridgis have been destroyed. Houses have been washed away, several cf them carried right out to asn, and fences and crops have besn utterly ruined. Many of the et tilers were severely handicapped by the flo-d of 1894 and their places are heavily mortgaged. They have- now, in many cases, lost ail their stock and their year's work, so that blank ruin stares them in the face, or even in cases where they can raise more money on their holdings they must have a very uphill fight for many years to came ; indeed some families may be said to be utterly jde'stitute, and monetary aid is urgently needed throughout a large area. Captain Russell, R. R. D. M'Lean, M.H.R., and others have promptly find generously come to tha aid of the sufferers, pnd the latter has already, in addition to an "offer to grazs stock for the settlers, headed a local subscription list with £100. At Hastings, and especially at Clive, the results have been most disastrous. As instancing th» force of tbe flood at Hastings it may be mentioned that a log of wood coming down on the current entered through the front door of a house, went clean through a double chimney, and passed put at the back wall. The scene at - Clive beggars description. Water lies spread over all the low land. HayBtacks, fences, roofs of houses, pigsties, turnips, pnions, and the dead bodies of animals are mixed up in bewildering confution along the hedgerows. In one place 18 cows belonging to a dairyman named Riley were jammed in a yard together with*S heterogeneous collection of pig*, sheep, and fowls, and, all maddened by the rising flood, struggled till their sufferings were mercifully ended by the waters. One caw, hemmsd in a ihed, forced her head and shoulders through -a crack, and struggled till she was*drowned. Many of the inhabitants of Clive had to seek shelter in M 'Kay's Hotel, j 3!ho interior of the Hotel presents a painful speccacle. A correspondent of a local paper gives a . graphic description of it: — «• The water -rose several feet in the hotel. As it crept up inch by inch it caused grave apprehension for the safety or even thi3 large building. The rooms in the hotel were ■o crowded that there was not even room to sit down. The diicomfort was not by any moana lessened by- the conduct of uncouth brutes of < men who persisted in smoking, and so causing : much inconvenience to the women and children. ; .What provisions there were in the housa wera i Boon consumed, and many of them had nothing i to eat for two days but a crash of bread.-: The people are now dependent en what is j being sent down from Hastings and Napier, i tho latter being brought up to the wabhout beyond Waitangi by train and ferried across the river. The steamer Bella is now running from Napier also. I went into several houses at Clive, and the wreck is* simply awful. One settler told me that he saw a little water on the floor while he was having his tea about 6 o'clock, and suggested to his wife that it might bo advisable to clear out before bedtime, in case of anything serious happening. He had hardly got the words out of his mouth when the water rose over his knees, and he had barely time to catch up his two little children and escape with them and his' wife. Another settler begged me to go and see his hou«e. Here I found the mark of the water sft up the wall. There were 2ft of silt on the floor, and everything in the place was irretrievably ruined. Books and papers (many of them acientific works of over 40 years' collecting), clothing, food — everything gone, and nothing left but the few clothes he and his family were able to escape in. He had .managed to get one room scraped tolerably clean, and in this, wet and muddy aa it was, a family of six or seven bad to pass the night without bedding or even dry ordinary clothiDg. There are many other instances, no doubt, equally bad. So suddenly did the water come upon them that this man and his eldest son were nearly drowned in getting the children out. The father and son were holding on to a clothes line for over twi hours before they were rescued. A very serious aspect of the floods, so far as Napier is concerned, is the washout at Waitangi, and a little further on a*< the Awatoto lagoon. This has been caused by the Tutaekuri River bursting its banks and flowing through the country a little to the south of the lagoon in two places. One of the breaches came dowu into the W»itangi Creek with terrific force, carrj ing away 600 ft of the railway, as well as the ordinary traffic bridge, and washing away .the line.. The other branch has washed a breach from the corner of the lagoon to the sea, and here it is that the most serious difficulty has to be faced, for it is feared the sea will uoir flow round into the lagoon, and Napier will be left as it is at present — on an island. Tho consequeuco in this case will be most serious. A few miles further south great damage has been done by the Ngaruroro River, which burst its bounds at the Roy's Hill stopbank. It is abont 40 years since the river came down this ivay. A great volume of water has in the present instance flowed over the adjacent land, and it was this overflow that flooded the Havelock country. The stream continues to run in the old watercourse, and it will be necessary to rapair the stopbank at considerable expense before the full body of water can be deflected into its proper channel. On the Wanganni section the mort serious damage is the washing away of the Rangitikei Bridge. ' It will cost £10,000 or £15,000 to replace the structure. Mr Frank M'Lean, Government engineer, has gone up to-day to contult with the engineer for the section as to what had best be done. The train from Wellington this morning took up a cable and material for the purpose of throwing a cage over, so as to temporarily restore communication. A temporary bridge will afterwards be constructed over which the railway Carriages can be shunted. This will probably take several week*, but it nill be months before the river can be properly bridged and through communication with engines restored. It will he a question for the department to . consider whether a cyclinder bridge should not now be put across the river. A wire bridge cannot be depended on, as the river sometimes scours out to a depth of 14ffc or 15ft in one night. The resources of the Railway department will be most severely fcaxed, for there is barely enough bridge timber in stock in the North Island. The 'engineers (who have had several sleepless nights) are, however, setting about their arduous duties

energetically, and the necessary works will apparently bo carried out; with the utmost expedition. The traffic managers, too, are doing «H in their power to cope with the difficulties in the way of keeping up communication. Mr Donne, who is one of tbe smartest officers in the service, has been particularly energetic. Last night the "Wellington station was open all night, and the telegraph operators had bunks made up near their instruments.

A man who had just come into Longburn states that all tho Rangitikei bridges (four in number) ara washed away. The "Vinegar Hill bridge was a recent structure, and cost between £5000 and £6000.