Tornado then hailstorm blast through Motueka
The owners of a popular fruit and vegetable shop in Motueka had to run for cover as a ‘‘mini tornado’’ tore through their glasshouse minutes before a freak hailstorm.
Victoria Gardens Fruit and Vege owners Peter and Caroline Pomeroy were outside preparing for Saturday’s hailstorm when they had to take shelter in a shipping container from flying shards of glass.
Peter Pomeroy told Stuff yesterday he felt lucky to have survived the tornado, which came ‘‘out of the blue’’ just minutes before the hailstorm which swept across Tasman, hitting Motueka particularly hard, with dozens of homes and businesses affected.
The Pomeroys took shelter in a shipping container near the chicken coop, where they stored a few tonnes of chicken feed and other material. Pomeroy had to hold the door closed while his wife braced herself against the walls.
‘‘I managed to hold the door closed, but the thing just moved around us, the tornado was rumbling it around. It didn’t lift it, but it moved it around.’’
The shipping container was moved about five centimetres off the base it stood on.
Pomeroy said the whole thing lasted about 30 seconds, but it was absolutely terrifying, and Caroline, still recovering from a recent surgery, was injured in the rush to shelter and during the storm.
‘‘I’m just lucky I got to wake up and cuddle my wife this morning,’’ Pomeroy said.
He said while they were out he could see it coming, but didn’t know what it was at first.
‘‘Over this [shipping] container I could see plastic stuff just wafting around up high . . . then there was a whole lot of stuff below it, then the wind hit.’’
Pomeroy said he was grateful the pair were still out by the chicken coop when the tornado struck, as their usual pathway back to the house was right beside the glass greenhouse, which was shattered and spread hundreds of metres by the wind.
‘‘We had neighbours telling us they saw it, they said it was like watching a movie. It just went down and then everything went up after it. They thought their own windows were breaking, and then they realised it was glass from our [green]house falling from the sky.’’
He said a set of doors blown off an outbuilding had landed on their neighbour’s car, another was
scattered through their own land, and there was glass everywhere.
‘‘Four houses down they’ve got it, about 120 metres away.’’
Friends and family were already getting on with the cleanup, clearing out as much glass as they could to make the place safe to work on for the rebuilding phase. He said he was overwhelmed by the support shown by the community.
‘‘I’ve had to turn them away for health and safety because of all the glass, but just knowing they’re there has been incredible.’’
He said his entire crop of tomatoes was a write-off, tens of thousands of dollars worth, since there could be glass shards in the fruit, and their fruit and vege shop had to close temporarily, waiting for electrical assessment.