Floods and ice cause school holiday travel chaos

NZ Herald

7 Jul, 2016 11:43 PM3 mins to read

Outram volunteer firefighters clear the Henley - Berwick Rd after a courier van left the road after striking black ice this morning. Photo / Gerard O'Brien

Floods and ice around New Zealand are hitting school holiday travel plans.

With schools closing today for the July break, holidaymakers heading for the Coromandel are urged to delay their journeys after floodwaters hit the region.

Katikati in the Bay of Plenty was close to being cut off this morning. In Coromandel, the seaside community of Tairua was cut off to the south and several other roads were closed due to slips or flooding.

A Thames-Coromandel District Council spokeswoman asked people heading to the region for the school holidays to delay their journeys until later this afternoon when floodwaters were expected to recede.

There are also reports of delays and cancellations at major airports.

Ice is distrupting travel at Dunedin Airport.

No flights are landing or taking off at the airport.

Dunedin Airport spokeswoman Megan Crawford said there was ice on the runway and it was raining.

"It was 0 degrees Celsius an hour ago and it's still raining. We need a little bit more heat on the runway before we can get things moving again."

Flights inbound and outbound for Christchurch, Wellington and Auckland had been affected.

Flights affected include Air New Zealand arrivals NZ5057 from Christchurch and NZ5443 from Wellington, which were cancelled because they could not land due to the ice.

Four departing Air New Zealand flights had also been affected.

Two - NZ50162 bound for Christchurch at 8.20am and NZ5048 bound for Wellington at 9.10am - were cancelled.

Two more - NZ410 to Wellington and Auckland, due to depart at 6.25am, and NZ5012 to Christchurch, due to depart at 7.30am - have been delayed.

Full details are available on the airport's website.

Crawford said roads were also affected by ice.

"It's pretty bad. There's actually a police cordon turning people back at the turn-off to the airport [on State Highway 1]. Unless they really need to go south they're turning them back."

Wellington Airport spokeswoman Arpita Dutta said there were some delays caused by the situation in Dunedin. Full information was available on the airport's website.

"It's flights from the South Island, we've got no issues weather-wise here."

Christchurch Airport spokeswoman Yvonne Densem said delays were a result of weather at other airports.

"It's not a problem at our end."

According to the airport's website inbound and outbound Invercargill flights had been delayed.

An Auckland Airport spokeswoman said the airport was operating normally.