The front of this house in Ravensbourne turned into a torrent. Photo / Gregor Richardson
The front of this house in Ravensbourne turned into a torrent. Photo / Gregor Richardson
Residents in Henley on the Taieri are being advised to evacuate as rain continues to fall and flood waters rise in Dunedin.
The front of a house in Ravensbourne has been turned into a waterfall and there is widespread surface flooding across the city and Mosgiel, the Leith is running very high and close to breaching its banks in places.
The Otago Regional Council has opened the Riverside spillway gates on the Taieri River at Outram to divert flooding into a ponding area part of the Taieri Flood Protection Scheme.
Both police and NZTA have warned against non-essential travel, with NZTA saying strong winds were also bringing down trees.
Council city services general manager Sandy Graham said police started door-knocking Henley properties this afternoon advising them to evacuate and be prepared to be out of their homes for several days.
At this stage, residents have decided to stay in their homes.
Access to Henley is limited with one road already closed due to a slip.
The Dunedin City Council is also asking residents in the city to avoid using showers, dishwashers and washing machines to ease pressure on the city's wastewater network, as the predicted torrential rain begins to hit.
Ravensbourne and Mosgiel are being hit by some of the worst flooding, with Gordon Rd now closed and inundated with surface flooding.
By just after 4pm the amount of rain falling appeared to be easing and according to the MetService the deluge was expected to ease before trailing off almost completely by 8pm.
A Fire and Emergency spokesman said fire crews had been called out to 14 flooding events in Dunedin and surrounding areas in the past few hours.
Most of the flooding has been isolated to single properties where water has got into a basement or come through a roof, the spokesman said.
In Ravensbourne the front of a property, opposite from Moller Park, had turned into a waterfall.
Some residents in the suburb were without power.
Several dips on State Highway 88 by Ravensboune were deep in surface flooding, forcing heavy traffic to grind almost to a standstill.
A large slip just past Maia closed the highway's northbound lane, forcing firefighters to act as impromptu traffic controllers.
At least one car was immobilised by flood waters.
Meanwhile in Manapouri St, driveways and sections transformed into waterfalls, as firefighters scrambled to clear drains.
The flooding appeared to have subsided somewhat shortly after 4pm.
Earlier water needed to be pumped off the runway at the Dunedin Airport after a Air New Zealand flight from Auckland was forced to land in Christchurch this afternoon.
Airport marketing and communications manager Megan Crawford said standing water on the runway meant it was too dangerous for the Air New Zealand jet to land but a smaller ATR plane was able to land safely not long after.
"At the moment we're just monitoring the situation and our rescue fire team are pumping water out around where we are and we're obviously we're hoping this rain out where we are just eases a little bit."
The airport's website would be updated with any further cancellations or delays.
Dunedin man Simon Bishop was on the plane which tried to land twice before diverting to Christchurch.
"It was pretty scary the first time we didn't even break the cloud before we speed off then the next time we got pretty low but hate to pull out again."
Surface flooding at a property on the Taieri. Photo / Gregor Richardson
The plane and passengers would be flown back to Auckland because there is no accommodation in Christchurch, Mr Bishop said.
Fire crews are responding to multiple flooding calls throughout Dunedin.
In Ravensbourne the front of a property, opposite from Moller Park, had turned into a waterfall.
There was significant surface flooding between Dunedin and Ravensbourne on SH88 and part of the hillside had come down just before Ravensdown.
Speaking from the Dunedin Civil Defence Emergency Management bunker this afternoon, council city services general manager Sandy Graham said the bunker had been activated, but an emergency had not yet been declared.
"We're not declaring, we're just activating, which means we've got folk from all the key areas in the Bunker, so we can have good clear communication to keep a watching brief on what's happening.
"We're about to have that period of heavy rain that was predicted, so it makes sense to pull folk together just so we can monitor it really closely in case we can act quickly.''
"There's lots of moving parts, so it's easier to move everyone into one place.''
Taieri River at Outram, taken mid-morning today. Photo / ORC
Dunedin Civil Defence is calling for volunteers to help with sandbagging in South Dunedin.
They are asking for people to go to the Dunedin Ice Stadium car park in Victoria Rd and bring a shovel if possible.
Mosgiel and South Dunedin residents concerned about flooding could collect sandbags from the Memorial Park car park, the Hotel Taieri car park at the corner of Burns and Kings Sts and the Ice Stadium car park.
