KEY POINTS:
Search-and-rescue teams last night found the body of a 56-year-old woman swept away in a swollen stream while tramping on Mt Taranaki.
The heavy rain and high winds that lashed the lower North Island disrupting flights, closing roads and damaging property, failed to reach the top of the country.
The woman was last night identified as Diane May Campbell-Hunt, a leading ecologist and botanist and mother of four. In August 2006, she was awarded $96,987 in a Top Achiever Doctoral Scholarship.
She and her 17-year-old daughter were hiking back from Lake Dive, in Egmont National Park, towards the information centre at Dawson Falls.
They had spent the night in the Lake Dive Hutt and were about 2 1/2 hours into the three-hour journey when the mother was swept away in a flash flood just after midday. The pair had already successfully crossed two streams.
Inspector Michael Coleman, from the police central communications centre, said Mrs Campbell-Hunt had been carrying a heavy backpack and toppled over. Her daughter ran ahead frantically searching for cellphone coverage and was able to phone emergency services 20 minutes later.
Search-and-rescue teams went in on foot as strong winds stopped them from being able to use a helicopter.
New Plymouth police Sergeant Andrew Ross, who was co-ordinating the search, said: "Those streams are little more than a trickle normally but heavy rainfall can turn them into a raging torrent." An hour later they can be back to normal."
Meanwhile, about 400 households and businesses are without power in parts of Taranaki, the Manawatu and Wairarapa.
About 6500 households and businesses had their power cut at some point yesterday.
Operations manager for lines company Powerco, Ross Dixon, said power should be restored some time today.
Yesterday morning Wellington Airport was closed because of gusts of up to 160km/h. Air New Zealand spokeswoman Tracy Palmer said 15 flights had been cancelled by mid-morning with 1500 people affected.
Winds were strongest in Wellington and the Wairarapa, where a truck and trailer unit was blown over on the Masterton bypass. The Rimutaka Hill Rd on State Highway 2 was closed for a time after a car on the Wairarapa side of the hill was blown into a bank.
Several other roads were closed because of surface flooding and slips.
Firefighters in Wellington and Wairarapa attended almost 100 weather-related call-outs yesterday morning.
"It's stretched our resources, but luckily there haven't been any injuries," a Wellington police spokesman said.
The rain was expected to ease in the area last night, but winds would remain strong for a couple of days, forecasters said.
- additional reporting OTAGO DAILY TIMES and NZHERALD STAFF
