FLOOD HAVOC

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 77, Issue 109, 10 May 1934, Page 6

FLOOD HAVOC

POSITION ON PENINSULA LAKE OUTLET OPENED DANGER NOW LESSENED. [ Per Press Association. I CHRISTCHURCH, May 9. Although heavy rain is still falling, and the southerly storm continues with violence scarcely abated, the plight of the unhappy people of Little River is better to-day than it has been since Saturday morning, when the flood waters rose to a dangerous height Attempts to open the outlet from Lake Forsyth to the sea succeeded last night after much arduous toil and without risk. Ordinarily it is considered hopeless to endeavour to open the outlet in a southerly storm, because the seas close it almost immediately, but on this occasion the heavy pressure of water at the unprecedented level in the lake created a scour sufficient to overwhelm the force of the waves. An opening of a few yards only was cut in the shingle spit, but this quickly widened to 70 yards, and the water rushed out through a wide and deep channel.

Efforts are now being concentrated on repairing the Little River water supply. Many houses are now without water because the pipes have been carried away or smashed.

The train service is now normal, and trains are carrying water in tanks, which has provided some relief. Rain water is also being saved in all available receptacles. Service cars got through to-day, but with running boards awash in places where the road is still covered by water.

It is impossible to give any reliable estimate as to the amount of damage. Bridges have gone, roads are washed away ur blocked by slips, farm lands scoured away and covered with a deposit of clay, shingle, boulders and dead timber and other flood debris, fences destroyed or damaged, and houses an an indescribable condition. Also it is impossible to count the losses of stock. Much of the roadway has entirely disappeared. A waterfall which crashed down on to the road scouring out a deep hole, emerged from a settler’s cowshed above the highway.

Communication has been restored with some of the valleys previously isolated, but with others no normal communication will be possible for weeks. One of those isolated by slips is Commander Hail, of Peraki. He cannot reach Little River even with horses. His homestead, one of the best on the Peninsula, narrowly escaped being washed away. Commander Hall spent I some time to-day removing eels from rooms in his house. The ground over which the flood passed is littered with

Slips on the Peninsula are numberless. The whole district will be permanently scarred.

Rain, after the cessation yesterday, began again last night and fell steadily again all to-day. In Christchurch, since the commencement of the storm, 6.55 inches have > fallen —an unprecedented rainfall for the Canterbury plains. On the Peninsula the amount has been very much greater.