Wettest hour in December on record

A short but brutal storm delivered two hours of thunder, lightning and heavy downpours to Auckland yesterday.

Thunderstorms battered the region starting around 8am causing power outages, flight cancellations, flooding and school closures, with lightning injuring a worker at a south Auckland business.

The storms hit the entire region with lightning strikes reported from Orewa down to Manukau. At 9.30am MetService was showing more than 860 lightning strikes had struck the region.

The storm had seen the wettest hour in December in Auckland on record, National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (Niwa) said, adding it was also the wettest summer hour since 1975.

There were ongoing disruptions at Auckland airport, with flights delayed or cancelled.

Several aircraft required engineering inspections because of possible lightning strikes.

Air New Zealand Chief Operational Integrity Standards Officer Captain David Morgan said while aircraft were insulated and designed to withstand lightning strikes, they must be inspected before they could depart.

Fire Services spokesman Colin Underdown said they were ‘‘inundated’’ with emergency callouts. There had been about 100 calls between 8am and 10am. Most of the calls were lightning strikes, flooding and alarm activations because of the electrical storm.