Front row seat to devastation
Glenduan residents had front row seats to the chaos that unfolded while their homes remained unscathed during ex-cyclone Fehi’s wrath.
At midday on Thursday, as many coastal residents’ homes flooded, Glenduan inhabitants watched on as water lapped at their homes and sea debris was dumped on their street.
Seafield Terrace resident Chris Cowles said the conditions were ‘‘apocalyptic’’.
‘‘I’ve never seen anything like it in my whole life.
‘‘It was something you’ll never forget.’’
Chris and his wife, Andrea’s home suffered no damage with only ‘‘a wee bit of water’’ seeping through their yard and shed.
Chris didn’t come away unscathed from the force of the weather though. ‘‘I got dumped twice.’’ He said he went down the road to help a neighbour.
‘‘A wave bloody bowled me over. I was hanging on to a stone in front of his house.’’
‘‘Another one dumped me’’ he said, on his return home but luckily his neighbour grabbed him.
After losing the battle with the strong surge of water, Chris said he sat on his balcony and watched the scene from his second storey.
Big logs were being tossed around ‘‘like driftwood’’ and ‘‘toothpicks’’.
Rocks were ‘‘blown on to the lawn like pebbles’’.
Waves were banging together higher than the electric wires he said.
‘‘The waves were really filthy, dirty brown and would just go whack.’’
Chris said the power poles in front of their home came down.
He watched as one gave way due to the erosion of the road.
‘‘It was just sitting there because it was hanging by the wires and slowly it just went..
‘‘It wasn’t blown over it was because the sea had eaten out the wall.’’
He estimated 1.5 metres of the road had been washed away.
Airlie Street further up was reduced to one lane due to the road disappearing into the sea.
Power poles that had once stood on the sea side of the road were replaced on the residential side.
The clean up down Seafield Tce is still being carried out after the road was impassable on Thursday.
Andrea said the road was ‘‘clear compared to the other day’’.
Boulder Bank Scenic Reserve was knocked around.
The playground’s surface has been changed beyond recognition with the bark that once lay below the equipment now strewn across the grounds.
Todds Valley resident Dana Russell said she was a regular visitor to the park with her three children.
‘‘It’s a bit of a shock really. I didn’t expect to see it this bad.’’
‘‘Until you see it, you don’t really realise. It’s pretty crazy.’’ ‘‘The force must’ve been huge.’’ Resident Bernard Downey’s home was surrounded by water with only the garage flooding.
Downey said he was ‘‘heartened’’ by the response he had from people helping to clean up.
‘‘As soon as I started to clean up, all these people just appeared out of nowhere and it all got done like that in a couple of hours – people I didn’t know.’’
‘‘They did the same thing for the woman next door. It was really nice.’’
Glenduan residents were assured they would be supported as Nelson City Council’s works and infrastructure chair, Stuart Walker visited the area on Saturday afternoon.
Walker told the residents he wanted feedback about what they believed was ‘‘the best way’’ to deal with the issue.
‘‘The engineers could have all the ideas in the world which are theoretical but you’ve experienced it.’’
‘‘I think we will learn a heck of a lot from this and I think that central government will suddenly become aware that whatever has happened ... is going to happen again.’’